


Thick Headed Fools

by FalseRobot



Category: RWBY
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst with a Happy Ending, Attempt at Humor, Enemies to Lovers, Eventual Romance, F/F, F/M, One-Sided Attraction, Secret Relationship, compromising positions
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-01-22
Updated: 2019-02-14
Packaged: 2019-03-08 07:17:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 10
Words: 44,879
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13453212
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/FalseRobot/pseuds/FalseRobot
Summary: Updated Summary: Set against a backdrop of a post breach Vale, Yang Xiao Long and Adam Taurus encounter one another. But can they and the rest of Remnant deal with the rippling effects of their encounter?





	1. That saying about plans and first contact.

**Author's Note:**

> Disclaimer: I don't own RWBY.  
> Also cross-posted on fanfiction.net

The morning after the Breach occurred…

 

Yang leans over her dorm bathroom’s sink, jittering with excitement as she inspects her scroll sitting on the sink. In front of her, sits the perfect date plan that was guaranteed to get Blake to say yes for when Yang confesses her feelings. To say that Yang outdid herself would be a gross understatement.

 

Step 1: Attend the weekend premiere of a highly anticipated film adaptation of one of her and Blake’s all-time favorite romance novels that Yang had won a pair of tickets for.

 

Step 2: After the movie, the pair would make their way to a fancy yet modest restaurant for a romantic candlelit dinner with a stunning view of Vale to discuss the movie in detail.

 

Step 3: A moonlit walk on a nearby public beach where Yang would bring Blake into a loving embrace and ask her to be her girlfriend.

 

*Knock Knock*

 

“Yes?” Yang asks.

 

“How much longer are you going to be in there, Yang?” an annoyed Weiss asks from the other side.

 

“Whoops, sorry.” Yang immediately responds, gathering up her scroll and shoving it into one of the Beacon Academy blazer’s inner pockets as she exits the bathroom.

 

“Finally.” Weiss says flatly underneath her breath as she pushes past Yang.

 

Strolling into Team RWBY’s dorm room Yang notices Blake in her casual clothes laying on the bottom bunk of her and Yang’s makeshift bunkbed reading a romance novel and her little sister/team leader, Ruby also in her casual clothes, is at her study desk working on her high impact sniper scythe when she looks at Yang with an odd look on her face.

 

“Yang, you do know that there no classes and tomorrow because of the Breach yesterday, right?” Ruby asks eyeing the school uniform for Beacon Academy that Yang is wearing.

 

Yang stares at Ruby for brief moment then remembers the events of the previous days. “Oh yeah, I must’ve been more tired than I thought.”

 

Yang quickly heads over to her dresser in front of bunkbed and begins to strip down, giving Blake a little show.

 

“REALLY, YANG?!” Ruby yells out as her face becomes the color of her hooded cloak while she shields her eyes.

                                                                                                                                             

“Oh come on, Rubes. It’s not like you haven’t seen this before.” Yang teases, wiggling her panty-clad butt in Blake’s general direction. When Yang looks up at Blake to see if she was having an effect, she discovers Blake looking over the top of her book with hungry eyes as Weiss, wearing only a towel, brushes past Yang, mumbling something about forgetting something. Ruby faints with embarrassment at the sight of Weiss. Yang seeing Blake’s reaction brings a small smile to her face and motivates her to put on her casual clothes even faster.

 

Later after Weiss finished her usual morning routine, Ruby finished her daily maintenance of Crescent Rose, and the team had some late breakfast in the cafeteria Yang gets an opportunity to get Blake alone, which she takes.

 

“Hey Blake!” Yang calls out from behind Blake who tenses up before sighing in frustration as she turns around to face Yang.

 

“What is it, yang?”

 

“Before the Breach happened, I happened to win a pair of movie tickets for the premiere of Tiger in the Ballroom this weekend.” Yang shifts in her spot with nervous excitement. “So… I was wondering if you would like to go out with me and maybe we can get some dinner afterwards?”  


Conflict could be visibly seen on Blake’s face as tries to make her decision. “I… I’m sorry Yang. I already made plans this weekend.”

 

“With who?” Yang asks with slight uneasiness coloring her voice.

 

“With uh…” Blake looks away for a brief second. “Sun. He kept asking me all last week and because of the Breach, I thought I could use the distraction.”

 

“Oh. Okay then. What about…”

 

“I’m sorry, Yang. There’s somewhere I need to be and I don’t have much time left.” Blake quickly interrupts after taking a quick look at her scroll. Blake hurries down the hallway in the direction she was originally going, leaving a dejected Yang standing there in the middle of the hallway. Yang sighs and begins heading in the opposite direction towards the training rooms.

 

A few hours and a bunch of unlucky punching bags later, a depressed Yang with her gym bag slung over her shoulder is walking down the hallway that leads to RWBYs dorm after Professor Goodwitch kicked her out after giving her a week long ban from training room she was using for destroying most of the spare punching bags. Ahead of her, she sees Weiss about to enter the dorm when suddenly the door opens up a pair of familiar arms that belong to a certain cat Faunus pull Weiss inside. Curious, Yang jogs up to the dorm’s door that is slightly ajar as silently as possible and peeks inside to see an anxious Blake sitting on her bunk along with a dumbfounded Weiss standing in front of her.

 

“-ll was that for, Blake?”

 

“Weiss, we need to talk.”

 

“What about?”

 

“Yang.” Blake states flatly.

 

“Oh.” Weiss simply says, sitting down next to Blake and taking her hand in a soothing way. “What about her?”

 

“Well you know she has been trying to ask me to be her girlfriend for the past year and how she actually was subtle about it.”

 

“Uh-huh”

 

“I think it’s time we told Yang about our relationship.” Blake says, shocking Weiss and shattering Yang’s heart.

 

“No. Absolutely not!” Weiss nearly shouts as she suddenly gets off the bed which convinces Yang to not to burst in at that moment.

 

“Weiss, please. She’s getting desperate now.”

 

“Then keep rejecting her like you normally do until she gives up like Jaune did.

 

Blake rolls her eyes at the comment. “You weren’t on the receiving end, or was collateral damage like Ruby was, of an admittedly sexy strip tease she gave this morning when she “accidently” wore her school uniform when she “forgot” that classes weren’t being held for the next two days because of the Breach.”

 

While Weiss stands there flabbergasted by what Blake revealed, Yang mentally beats herself up brutally for ignoring the fact that her baby sis was right there at her desk watching.

 

“For your information, Weiss. I only noticed because I was enjoying the view of your towel clad body as you brushed past her little show.” Blake assures, bringing relief to Weiss’ body.

 

Weiss sighs. “My answer is still no, Blake.”

 

“Why?”

 

“I barely don’t trust sober Yang with this sort of information…” Blake looks Weiss in confusion for choice of words. “…And don’t get me started on the levels of mistrust I have for drunk Yang.”

 

“Barely?” Blake asks for clarification.

 

“Remember that time she nearly outed you as a Faunus in front of Cardin and his gang of hoodlums with those not-so-subtle cat puns that were absolutely horrendous to listen to?” Weiss points out causing Blake and Yang to flinch at the memory of said event. “We were lucky that neither he nor Nora caught on.

 

Hearing this, Yang decides to go back to the training rooms but she remembers that Goodwitch’s ban was effective immediately when suddenly she remembers a boxing gym she and her dad used to go to before and during her time at Signal academy. So she slowly backs away from the door to avoid alerting Blake’s sensitive ears to her presence and goes to back the way she came. Reaching the end of the hallway, she turns around again, takes a deep breath, walks down the way she came in with her normal walking style, and proceeds to walk into the dorm room as if nothing happened, startling Blake and Weiss from their conversation.

 

“Y- Yang!!” They both exclaim at the same time.

 

“Oh hey guys. What’s up?”

 

“N- Nothing.” Weiss stammers.

 

Yang gives Blake and Weiss a concerned look. “Blake, is Weiss giving you a hard time about something?”

 

“N- No she’s not.” Blake responds rather unconvincingly.

 

Yang walks over to Blake and pulls her into a hug, much to Weiss and Blake’s surprise. “It’s okay, Blakey. We all know Ninjas in Love is just porn with plot.”  


Blake squirms out of Yang’s hug and pushes her away. “What do you want, Yang?”

 

“I’m about to head to into town to visit an old boxing gym I used to go and I just came to retrieve Ember Celica just in case I run into some Grimm stragglers.” Yang replies, slowly backing from a glaring Weiss and retrieving her shotgun gauntlets. “Don’t worry, I’ll text Ruby on where I’ll be.”

 

“Why do you need to go to this boxing gym when Beacon has perfectly good training rooms?” Weiss asks eyeing Yang with suspicion as she inches her to Blake’s side possessively.

 

“I uh… may have gotten Professor Goodwitch angry at me and she uh… banned me from using the training rooms for a week. Effective immediately she said.” Yang sheepishly replies.

 

“Oh. And how did that happen, Ms. Xiao Long?”

 

“I got…” Angry, jealous, depressed “… a little excited about over a personal matter which led to me accidently destroying some of the training equipment.” Yang half-lies through her teeth.

 

“Ah understandable.” Blake says as Yang begins to leave the room.

 

“And don’t you dare send me the bill for any training equipment you accidently destroy.” Weiss calls out as Yang leaves the room, waving off Weiss’ comment. As Yang gets further and further down the hall, the false smile she has been wearing disappears from her face and a heartbroken expression slowly takes its place.

 

A short airship ride to the nearest airship station in Vale later, an emotionally torn Yang is slowly making her way towards the parking garage where her prized motorcycle, Bumblebee, is being stored. Along the way, she passes by various citizens going about their day, trying to recover from the frightening events of the other day and a large number of police officers patrolling the city with the aid of Atlesian Knight Robots that General Ironwood brought with him. Just when her heart calms down to give her mind a break, she passes by a bookstore and catches a glimpse of a long haired woman nose deep into a book inside the store.

 

The sight conjures up an image of Blake curled up in an armchair engrossed in a romance novel. When Yang blinks, Blake looks ups at her and a beautiful smile appears on her face, causing Yang’s heart to clench. Yang tears her gaze away from the sight and begins to run away without paying attention to where she is going as she tries to push away the memories of the past year of smiles, snarky comments, and Blake being Blake that bubble up.

 

Eventually, Yang runs out of breath forcing her to stop running. Taking a much needed moment to catch her breath, Yang discovers that she somehow made her way into an unfamiliar residential area that looked like it wasn’t affected by the Breach. Yang leans against of a building with the last vestiges of the memories that bubbled up at the bookstore slowly fades away when her scroll begins ringing.

 

“H- Hello?” Yang asks, answering her scroll.

 

“Yang? Where are you?” Ruby worriedly asks on the other end.

 

Yang curses underneath her breath for forgetting to text Ruby. “He- Hey Ruby. I’m currently in Vale at the moment.”

 

“Blake and Weiss mentioned something about that. They also mentioned that Professor Goodwitch banned you from the training rooms.” Ruby states. “What happened, Yang?”

 

“Nothing really happened. I just got a little excited over a personal matter that’s all.” Yang lies.

 

“Did Blake reject you again?”

 

Yang opens her mouth to refute that question when suddenly a woman screams out in terror somewhere near Yang followed by all too familiar barks of beowolves.

 

“What was that?” Ruby asks.  


“Trouble.” Yang simply states. “Rubes, I’ll most likely be back at the dorm sometime tomorrow. So good luck courting Weiss!”

 

“Yang! There’s nothing-“ Ruby begins to say when Yang hangs up the scroll.

 

Shoving the scroll back in her pocket, Yang cocks Ember Celica then proceeds to rush off towards the source of the scream and the barks. Less than a minute into her search, Yang reaches an intersection where the snarls and growls of the beowolves could be clearly heard and turning towards the source reveals a pair of beowolves attacking the caved in passenger side of a car with a woman trapped inside.

 

Yang launches herself at one of the beowolves with single dual blast to the ground and she buries her right fist then fire a shotgun blast into the top of the beowolf’s head which in turn buries it into the ground below killing the beowolf. At the same time, a red-haired man in a mostly black outfit dashes from the other side of intersection with clutching the grip of his sheathed sword and kills the other beowolf with a single upwards slash. Yang turns towards the other Beowolf but finds the man, who she finds oddly familiar, standing over the other beowolf’s dissolving corpse as he sheaths his sword. Without a second thought, she and the man rushes to the driver’s side of the car to make sure that the woman is okay.

 

“Thank you! Thank you! Thank you!” The Ram Faunus woman says over and over with tears of joy as she climbs out of the car. She pulls Yang and the red-haired man, who has a pair of small bull horns now that Yang has a better view of him, into a hug.

 

“Your welcome, ma’am.” Yang chuckles.

 

“But how did this happen?” the bull Faunus immediately asks.

 

The ram Faunus looks down and away as the relieved expression on her face becomes saddened. “Ever since those deplorable White Fang released horrible Grimm into the city yesterday, Faunus haters have risen up to form a vigilante group with the justification that the police and Atlesian army isn’t doing enough root out White Fang. So before I was attacked by those beowolves, I was being harassed by a couple members of the aforementioned group who thought I was a White Fang supporter who knew the Breach was going to happen just because I wasn’t affected in any way by what happened yesterday.”

 

The bull Faunus balls his fists while Yang puts a reassuring hand on the woman’s shoulder. “I’m sorry that you had to go through that.”

 

“It’s okay, dear. I was lucky a pair of clearly overworked police officers were nearby to arrest the harassers. After that I got into my car and started driving away, those awful beowolves somehow slipped through cracks of the city’s dragnets and blindsided my car and then you two showed up out of nowhere.” The woman explains.

 

“You’re very welcome, ma’am.” Yang says with a smirk.

 

“I- I should go.” The bull Faunus nervously says just before turning around and hurriedly walks away. Yang looks at him and sees the red rose emblem displayed on the back of his black coat. Suddenly, it all clicks into place as to where Yang has seen the man before. Last year after the failed White Fang raid at the docks and during Blake’s explanation of her past, Blake showed the rest of team RWBY her sketchbook which contained a photo of her ex-partner/boyfriend, Adam Taurus, and a really detailed sketch of his Wilt emblem.

 

“I should go too.” Yang says keeping an eye on the bull Faunus as he continues to walk away.

 

“Okay, Dear. Be safe and thank you again for your guy’s rescue.” The ram Faunus waves goodbye to Yang as Yang begins following the bull Faunus before turning to inspect her damaged car. “Now to see if my insurance will cover this.”

 

As Yang jogs to catch up to the bull Faunus, an idea pops into her head and each step makes it more and more enticing: Knockout Adam Taurus, hand him over General Ironwood, and become the hero of Vale after whatever the White Fang was planning to do fails horribly. Then, she would return to Blake for her thank you kiss for rescuing her from her psycho ex-boyfriend and they would live happily ever after. Yang grins at the idea as she slows down when she catches up to the bull Faunus, who turns into a nearby alley.

 

Yang stops for a moment to take a deep breath then marches into the alley to find the bull Faunus leaning against the wall. A gentle gust of wind blows past Yang and the bull Faunus sniffs the air with curiosity.

 

“Adam Taurus?” Yang knowingly asks to get his attention before throwing a right hook at the bull Faunus.

 

“Yes?” Adam responds with a smirk on his face as he turns in time to see Yang’s punch fly towards him.

 

“Yes?” Adam responds with a smirk on his face as he turns in time to see Yang’s punch fly towards him.


	2. Seeds of Doubt

The day after the Breach…

 

Adam sits behind his desk in the manager’s office of the White Fang’s warehouse hideout that is just outside of Vale, rubbing his temples as he processes the events leading up to the Breach. After listening to the one of the few White Fang members that managed to escape getting captured or mauled by the rampaging Grimm has made him unsure what he should be feeling at the moment

 

“Uhh… Sir? Are you okay?” The grunt in front of him asks very nervously but all he gets in response was Adam holding up his index finger to signal that he needed more time.

 

Should Adam be confused on wondering how the base was discovered by four teenage huntresses in training, a Beacon Academy professor, and a dog?

 

Should he instead be grieving with the rest of his cell for members who lost their lives during the incident?

 

Should he be happy that he wasn’t there for the incident or that he and the rest of the White Fang cell he commands doesn’t have listen Roman Torchwick’s racist name calling for a while or the fact he now knows that Blake is in Vale?

 

Or should he be furious at the fact that the fiasco known as the Breach was caused by a small oversight, like a hole in the ceiling of the Mt. Glenn base that led to the surface that wasn’t sealed and/or concealed properly which led to an intruder accidently falling into the base leading to the rest of intruder’s group to the base which leads to Roman launching explosive filled train a week and a half earlier than planned leading right into the Grimm breaching the inner city of Vale and to the arrest of Roman Torchwick himself?

 

Adam lets out a sigh as these emotions swirl inside of him and causes the grunt that Adam nearly forgot was there flinch defensively. “Am I in trouble, sir?”

 

“No, no you are not in trouble.” Adam says wearily. “I am giving you today and tomorrow off to recover from what happened. Dismissed.”

 

“Thank you, sir!” The grunt hastily salutes then rushes out of the room. Immediately afterwards, Adams second-in-command, a bear Faunus by the name of Andre Felt, walks into the office and sits down where the grunt used to be.

 

“Adam.”

 

“Andre.”

 

“What happened?” Andre asks, seeing Adam’s current state

 

“A hole.” Adam angrily whispers with his head buried in his hands, deciding that anger is what he should be feeling right now.

 

“A hole?” Andre repeats back confused.

 

“A FUCKING HOLE THAT SOMEHOW EVERYONE MISSED FOR PAST YEAR WE’VE BEEN THERE!” Adam yells out, slamming his fists down onto the desk. “AND AS A RESULT, TORCHWICK FUCKS EVERYTHING UP!”

 

“How did he fuck up?” Andre inquires, cautiously backing up in the process.

 

“When the first intruder, this “Little Red”, fell down the hole that should have been found during the initial inspection and somehow she survives the fall. And what does Torchwick do when he finds out Little Red was caught…” Adam dramatically pauses for moment. “HE SIMPLY TOYS WITH HER AND DOES NOTHING ELSE!”

 

Andre is taken back by this. “What?!”

 

“Oh it gets better. Weiss Schnee was a part of the second group of intruders who came in search of Little Red.” Adam exclaims.

 

“Oh you got to be kidding me.” Andre groans in response.

 

“He could have ordered the grunts he had with him to tie her up and use her as a potentially valuable hostage to be against the other intruders! Then with Weiss Schnee in our grasp, we could have brought Jacques Schnee and the SDC to their knees.”

 

“But instead this Little Red escapes and Torchwick launches the train early to prevent it from falling into hands of the Atlesian Army.” Andre worriedly says in a calm voice. “Thus leaving us dead in the water until either us or our business associate, Cinder, comes up with something.”

 

Adam slumps in his chair exhausted. “That sums it up.”

 

Andre inspects once and an idea forms in his head. “And because of what happened yesterday, all of our contacts within the city have gone silent, fearful that they may be discovered.”

 

“So what?”

 

“Since Cinder and her three pets haven’t shared any information about the current situation in Vale, we are currently flying blind as well.” Andre calmly explains.

 

“What are you suggesting, Andre?”

 

“I’m suggesting that you go for a walk, clear your head, and find out what is happening in Vale.”

 

“No.” Adam flat out states. “We have dedicated scouts for this sort of thing.”

 

“Adam, I was outside when the grunt telling you what happened and I heard him mention Blake being a part of the group of intruders.” Andre puts out there. “The cell needs you to be level headed for the times to come and you are the most experienced one out of all of us.”

 

Adam grits his teeth as he begrudgingly accepts Andre’s logic. “And last time I checked, General Ironwood considers me more of threat than you, Adam.” Andre adds.

 

“Fine, I’ll go.” Adam says with huff after a moment of consideration. He gets up from behind the desk to retrieve his coat and Blush & Wilt then proceeds to leave the office leaving his Grimm mask behind.

 

“Thank you and be careful out there.” Andre says as Adam leaves the office with a ‘you’re welcome’ nod.

 

Adam shuts the door behind him and begins making his way towards the entrance of the warehouse when he passes the planning area. Pausing at the command center, he sees a fuming Cinder leaning over a table trying to come up with a new plan while Emerald dutifully sits nearby waiting for instructions, Mercury lays down taking a nap next to Emerald, and Neopolitan sitting the furthest away from the group as she plays on her scroll. Adam shakes his head at their lack of concern for their allies and continues on his way out.

 

Later, Adam reaches the outskirts of Vale when he immediately notices a group of police cars in front of a tavern along with group of officers putting a group of handcuffed civilians into the back of the police cars. Seeing this, Adam nervously lays a hand on his weapon as he passes by the scene and a couple of bystanders.

 

“Ugh, what is the world coming to these days?” one bystander asks.

 

“I know right? First the White Fang have the gall to release Grimm into the city. Now common criminals think that they have the run of the city.” The other bystander exclaims just before Adam is out of earshot. Adam continues on his way through the city making mental notes of the increased security he encountered along the way to distract himself from his stormy thoughts.

 

Suddenly, a series of gunshots ring out from a nearby alley and Adam rushes over to see what is happening. Inside the alley, he sees a group of four Atlesian Knights gunning down a group of six Creep Grimm while a pair of police officers guards the entrance to the alley. Adam makes note of the fact that Grimm are in still in the city for the near future operations before continuing on.

 

Eventually, Adam’s stomach rumbles as he makes his way through the semi busy markets. So, Adam stops at a nearby café for a meal and overhears an interesting conversation between a dog faunus and a male human.

 

“Man, I’m lucky that my store sells more than just Dust crystals.” The dog Faunus sighs.

 

“With all that has happened, you’re lucky the White Fang only took all of your Dust and nothing else.” The human replies.

 

Adam strolls up to the counter to order his meal and stands off to the side.

 

“Why did this have to happen to me?” the Faunus asks rhetorically.

 

The waitress flags Adam down and hands him his food then he goes to sit down near the conversation.

 

“At least you weren’t the only Dust shop to be robbed by the White Fang, right?” the human shrugs sheepishly. “So… silver lining?”

 

“But that’s the thing. My shop wasn’t associated with the SDC in anyway and the dust mining company I bought from has treated all of their miners fairly. I even illegally trespassed into one of their mines just to be sure they weren’t lying.” The Faunus shakes his head in disappointment. “Not to mention that I am obviously Faunus.”

 

Adam stops mid-bite when he hears this information.

 

A stray thought pops into the male human’s head. “This sort of thing didn’t always happen, right? Or am I crazy?”

 

“No, you’re not crazy. The White Fang used to only attack shops that weren’t Faunus friendly and denied service to Faunus’. The dog Faunus explains. “Nowadays, it feels like the White Fang no longer cares about the Faunus, especially after what happened yesterday.”

 

Adam grits his teeth and lets out a barely audible disheartened sigh at the last thing the dog Faunus said. He quickly finishes his meal and cleans up before hastily exiting the café to continue his journey through the city. As he walks through the city, Adam listens to various conversations without being obvious but all he finds is rising anger towards the White Fang among the Vale’s Faunus population and the general Vale population worrying about the future.

 

Adam eventually comes to a stop and rests against a side of a building to gather his thoughts on the current situation. He lets out a long and heavy sigh but a loud cry of pain shakes him from his thoughts. Ahead of him outside of a store, a male human clutching the side of his face and female human slowly advance towards a scared female deer Faunus.

 

“I said we are not a part of the White Fang!” The deer Faunus shakily exclaims as she backs up, eyeing the two humans cautiously.

 

“If that were the case, then why did you hide your bag from us?” the female human menacingly asks, pulling a hidden pistol from the waistband of her pants while her partner pulls out a knife.

 

Adam goes to rush over to the deer Faunus to defend her but a pair of human police officers rush past him. The officers quickly subdue, handcuff, and search the two humans, rescuing the deer Faunus in the process. The scene perplexes Adam as one of the officers checks on the deer Faunus without uttering a single racist comment while the other officer reads the pair of human’s Miranda rights without giving in to the pair’s poor attempts at trying to get out of the arrest through bribery and threats.

 

Adam cautiously walks past this scene while trying to resist stealing a couple glances as he makes a note to himself to ask Andre for reports on the Vale police force. As he fast walks through the city, Adam debates whether or not to return to the hideout since the information he collected so far has raised more questions than answers. Deep in his thoughts, Adam unknowingly wanders into a residential area.

 

Out of nowhere, the sound of a child crying shakes Adam from his thoughts, causing him to stop in his tracks. He looks around for source of the crying and what he finds chills him to the bone when he discovers an all too familiar scene. Across the street in a half destroyed building, a young boy on his knees cries his eyes out next to the dead bodies of what Adam assumes is the boy’s parents and about 15 feet from the boy are a couple of still dissolving corpses of some sort of Grimm as several police officers and a couple of Atlesian Knights stand guard over the scene.

 

A trembling Adam tears his gaze away from the scene and begins running away as a long forgotten and unwanted memory finds its way to the surface of his mind.

 

_Rain pounds against the windows of the wrecked Taurus household as an 8 year old Adam struggles and thrashes against the police officer’s arm that is trying desperately to hold him back. In front of him is the bodies of his parents lying face down in a puddle of blood. “Mom! Dad! Please, wake up!”_

Eventually, Adam stops running long enough to somewhat calm down as he leans against a building to steady himself and to keep himself from hyperventilating. He clutches his left hand in an attempt to stop himself from trembling as the unwanted memories fades away.

 

_An 8 year old Adam clutches the railing in the courtroom with nervous anticipation as the representative of the jury stands up to deliver the verdict. “On the charges of breaking and entering and two counts of first degree murder. We, the jury, finds the defendants… NOT GUILTY.”_

 

Suddenly the sound of metal and glass being crushed snaps Adam out of his memories as a terrified scream and the barks of a pair of beowolves. Looking around, he sees a pair of beowolves attacking a caved in passenger side of a car with a trapped ram Faunus woman inside in an intersection in front of him. Without thinking, he dashes towards the beowolves with a hand clutching Wilt’s grip when he sees no police officers or Atlesian Knights in the area.

 

Adam unleashes a single upwards slash into the beowolf killing it in front of him instantly as a blond figure comes flying out of nowhere burying their fist into the top of the other beowolf’s skull with what sounded like a shotgun blast. He sheathes Wilt inside of Blush’s sheath-like barrel and gets good look at the blond figure standing over the dissolving corpse of the other beowolf who turns out to be a young woman with a long wild mane of luscious blond hair. The sound of sound of someone opening a car door reminds him why he was there, so he and the blond woman rushes to the driver’s side of the car to make sure that the woman is okay.

 

“Thank you! Thank you! Thank you!” The Ram Faunus woman says over and over with tears of joy as she climbs out of the car. She pulls Adam and the blond woman into a hug when he smells a very familiar scent he recognizes from somewhere coming from the blond woman but can’t put a finger on it because it is mixed with an unknown scent coming the blond as well.

 

“Your welcome, ma’am.” The blond woman chuckles.

 

“But how did this happen?” Adam asks immediately afterwards.

 

The ram Faunus looks down and away as the relieved expression on her face becomes saddened. She begins explaining that because of Torchwick’s decision to launch the train early, a Faunus hating vigilante group, that the pair of human thugs Adam encountered earlier must have been a part of, rose up in response to the police’s and Atlesian Army’s inaction towards the White Fang. Adam balls fists while the blond puts a reassuring on the ram Faunus’s shoulder after she explains how she was being harassed for not being affected by what happened before being saved police.

 

Adam tunes out the conversation when he notices a police car coming towards them in the distance. “I- I should go.” Adam nervously says just before turning around and hurriedly walks away.

 

Questions on the future of his White Fang cell swirl in Adam’s head as he fast walks down the sidewalk. He shakes his head trying to get the questions out of his head but a stray thought worms its way in anyways: What if Cinder is wrong about the plan? He pauses for a moment scowling at the thought before turning into a nearby alley to gather up his thoughts.

 

“If only you didn’t leave, Blake.” He mutters to himself, leaning against a wall.

 

A gentle gust of wind blows into the alley past Adam’s nose causing him sniffs the air with curiosity. He finally realizes why he recognizes one of the smells the blond woman had on her because it is the one and only scent of Blake Belladonna.

 

“Adam Taurus?” Someone asks behind him as an idea on how to draw out Blake forms in his head.

 

“Yes?” Adam responds with a smirk on his face as he turns in time to see the young blond woman’s punch fly towards him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Feedback and comments of any sort is very much appreciated. It would help me gauge how well I am doing and allow me to see if I missed any mistakes I unknowingly made when writing.


	3. Back and Forth

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: Sorry for being a week late with this chapter. It shouldn’t have taken this long to finish this chapter but it did. So I hope that the chapter turned out well and that you guys enjoy it.

Yang’s right hook connects with Adam’s upper left side of his face, sending him back reeling a couple of steps. Adam shakes off the hit and throws up his arms defensively in time to block a follow up left hook. He backs up a couple steps to draw Wilt but Yang closes the distance before he has the chance to draw more than fraction of the blade and throws a right straight punch which Adam easily catches.

 

“I see Blake has told you about me.” Adam taunts as Yang struggles a little bit in his grasp. “How is she these days?”

 

“She’ll be better once you’re in jail.” Yang retorts just before head-butting Adam in the face to free her arm.

 

He staggers back a step as Yang backs away a couple steps as well and they both ready their weapons. They eye each other up and down looking for an opening as they circle around each other. Yang accidently stumbles on a garbage can and Adam launches forward delivering several straight punches to Yang’s body followed by a roundhouse kick that she barely blocks in time. She pushes Adam back then closes the distance between them instantly and lets loose a one-two combo into Adam’s chest immediately followed up by an uppercut that Adam dodges.

 

Yang’s angry red eyes meets up with Adam’s taunting ocean blue eyes as they resume their circling standoff. A minute of circling later, they decide to charge each other with their fists ready but two pairs of Taser prongs fly through the air and imbed themselves into Yang’s and Adam’s bodies. Yang and Adam fall to the ground twitching as 20,000 volts of electricity flow through their bodies while two police officers cautiously make their way into the alley.

 

They reload their Tasers and go to pick Yang and Adam off the ground but when they reach for their handcuffs, one of and the officers discovers that she does not have a pair of handcuffs on her. So instead they quickly read Yang and Adam’s Miranda rights and handcuff Adam’s left and Yang’s right wrists together with a pair bulky, futuristic looking handcuffs then proceeds to bring them over to their police cruiser. They take and secure Ember Celica and Blush & Wilt then does a quick search of their bodies for additional weapons while taking their wallets in the process.

 

“Ok Miss Xiao Long, Mr. Sampson.” The lead officer announces, reading the names off Yang’s and Adam’s IDs. “Before we get you guys down to booking for assaulting each other, answer me this: why were two fighting over?” The lead officer asks as his partner talks with the VPD Dispatch.

 

“A girl.” Yang and Adam say at the time not wanting to reveal their true intentions to each other. They scowl and look away from each other.

 

“Finally, a normal crime.” The officer mutters underneath a sigh of relief. The officer’s partner beckons him over to where she is sitting, leaving Adam and Yang awkwardly leaning against the car trying to get as far away from each other as possible.

 

Five minutes later, the lead officer comes back over to Adam and Yang. “Well, it looks like everything is in order this is the first time both of you have a committed a crime but that doesn’t mean that we, the VPD, are going to lessen your punishment because of this.”

 

Yang looks at Adam suspiciously after hearing this but says nothing as the lead officer seats them in the back of the police cruiser. All throughout the ride to the nearest detention center, the atmosphere in the cruiser was tense as Adam and Yang sit on opposite sides of the backseat warily eyeing each other and the handcuffs that link them together. When they arrive at the detention center, Yang unconsciously gulps nervously while Adam merely looks at the building with disinterest.

 

Adam and Yang are escorted inside to the reception area for the holding cells only to discover that the area is crowded with what appears to very rowdy humans and tense looking prison guards dressed in full riot gear. They are moved to the processing desk where a worn out police captain sits and is arguing with someone over the phone.

 

The escorting officers approach the desk but the captain holds up a finger, silently asking to hold for a moment. "Sir, we can't-." A pause. "But they-." The captain heavily sighs. "Yes sir." Another pause. "I... I understand, sir." The captain hangs up the phone in defeat.

 

He turns towards Adam and Yang, inspecting them in the process as the two officers lay Adam and Yang’s weapons, wallets, and scrolls onto the desk. "Were these two any trouble?" He asks the pair of officers.

 

"No sir. They were quietly fuming the entire ride over while staying as far away from each other."

 

“Have they said anything about why they were fighting?”

 

“They said it was over a girl.”

 

“So it wasn’t another hate crime.” The captain’s body sags a little with relief. “Thank you, you two. You’re dismissed.”

 

The two officers nod goodbye and leave the detention center, leaving Adam and Yang standing awkwardly in front of the captain. They stiffen when the captain turns his attention back to them after he takes and inspects their IDs and temporary huntsman licenses.

 

“So Ms. Yang Xiao Long, Mr. Manuel Sampson… here’s the deal. What you two did saving that woman from those beowolves when no one else was around is amazing and I wish more people were like that. But then you guys go and get into a fight with each other in a nearby alley.” The captain once again sighs. “Normally we would book you two for assault and keep you here until your trial or until someone posts bail. But due to recent events and the severity of the crimes, we decided that it would be best that we kept you overnight to allow you two to calm down and maybe make up.”

 

Yang and Adam look at the captain skeptical of the current situation when Yang speaks up. “Are you sure about this?”

 

“You’re lucky that you guys were arrested as you were. If you were caught using your weapons and whatever semblances you have, the charges against you two would be aggravated assault with a deadly weapon.” The captain replies as he returns their IDs and their IDs and temporary huntsman licenses to their personal effects then signals one of his coworkers to take away the personal effects and weapons, causing Yang and Adam relax a little.

 

The captain gets up from behind the desk allowing another officer takes his place and gets behind the two of them. Out of nowhere, he puts a hat onto Adam’s head to cover his bull horns.

 

“What’s this for?” Adam asks.

 

“To prevent the others from getting any bright ideas about picking a fight with you.” The captain replies, gesturing towards the other prisoners. “Now get moving. Can’t have the both of you standing around here all day.”

 

The captain escorts them past the other prisoners who give Adam and Yang a quick glance before returning to what they were doing beforehand. Moving out of the reception area, they enter a hallway with large temporary holding cells on either side crowded with tough looking prisoners. As they move down the hallway, Adam notices the pair of thugs from earlier in the day unhappily sitting in one of the cells, glaring at the captain as the group walks by. Soon, they enter a sparsely populated cellblock consisting of two-person holding cells and the captain stops in front of an empty cell that has bunkbeds that make Adam and Yang groan in despair.

 

“Well, here we are.” The captain announces, gesturing Adam and Yang into the cell which they enter. “I expect no trouble out of you two, so no funny business.”

 

Adam and Yang simply nod in response and the captain goes to unlock the handcuff but the telltale sounds of glass breaking and a fight breaking out echo down the hallway, drawing his attention. The captain curses underneath his breath as his radio activates. “Captain, we have a situation.”

 

“What happened?”

 

“A couple of prisoners got into an argument that escalated into them trading blows and then other prisoners started getting involved.”

 

The captain face palms and curses once again underneath his breath. “I’ll be there soon.” He quickly closes the cell door then rushes back to the reception area, leaving Adam and Yang still handcuffed together in the now closed cell.

 

Once they know that they are alone, Yang takes few deep breaths and activates her semblance to rip off her side of the handcuffs but the handcuffs don’t budge an inch.

 

“What are you trying to do?” Adam asks

 

“Trying to get these damn handcuffs off so I don’t have to be as close to you.” Yang replies through gritted teeth.

 

So as Yang struggles, Adam tries his best to maneuver him and Yang over to the bottom bunk, not wanting to stand around. But as Yang keeps trying, she and Adam become more tired as if the handcuffs were draining their aura. Adam watches with curiosity as Yang’s eyes fade from an angry red to a soft lilac purple as she gives up trying to force the handcuffs off.

 

Yang collapses onto the bed more exhausted than she should be. “Ugh, what are these handcuffs?”  


Adam chooses not answer that question but he worriedly looks down at the handcuffs that he recognizes as a model that quickly drains a person’s aura, preventing use of their semblance, when activated by the person’s activation of their aura and/or semblance. Looking past the handcuffs, he notices Yang staring at him with a question on her mind. “What?”

 

“Aren’t you going to pick the handcuff’s lock?”

 

“No.”

 

“No, you can’t because of the lock or no, you don’t know how?”

 

“Just no.” Adam sternly replies. _‘Because that was always Blake’s job.’_

 

“Wow, some terrorist you are.” Yang mutters, earning a sideways glare from Adam.

 

“Says the dumb blonde who chased down said terrorist.” Adam retorts, earning a heated glare from Yang.

 

“At least I’m not part of an organization that has become the thing they are fighting against.” Yang fires back, standing up.

 

“At least we are doing something about the oppression of the Faunus unlike people like you who sit around doing nothing about it.” Adam puts out there, standing up to get into Yang’s face.

 

“You don’t know me.” Yang growls, keeping her glare steady.

 

“Oh really. All I can see is an impulsive blonde who is begging for attention with how skimpy your outfit is.” Adam sneers, causing Yang to ball up her fists.

 

“Oh, how original. Did your parents not love you enough to teach how to treat a lady?” Yang taunts, unknowingly striking a nerve as Adam’s face darkens with restrained anger.

 

“How dare you say that!” Adam growls, taking the bait. “You don’t know what it’s like to lose everything you hold dear then fend for yourself in the alleys of a kingdom.” Adam jabs his index finger into Yang’s chest.

 

“And you don’t know what it’s like to take care of a little sister, who is too energetic for her own good, and a grieving father, who refuses to acknowledge anything around him, all alone when you’re only 7 years old.” Yang angrily responds.

 

They move back as far as they can and ball their fists getting ready to fight but a guard, drawn by the commotion, bangs on the bars of the cell. “Keep it down in there!”

 

When the guard is out of sight, Yang decides she had enough of this situation and proceeds to climb onto the top bunk with an angry huff. At the same time, Adam lays down on the bottom bunk but the handcuffs force Yang's arm to hang over the edge of the bed uncomfortably and force Adam's arm to be uncomfortably suspended in the air.

 

Adam tries to get into a more comfortable position but Yang has the same idea thus beginning a tug of war match between the two of them. As the tug of war goes on, Adam accidentally rolls off his bunk and falls onto the ground face first with a dull thud. When this happens, Yang is dragged off of her bunk with a surprised yelp and lands on top Adam. Both of them lay there for a minute or two groaning and making a mental note to not do that again.

 

"Nice going, numb nuts" Yang groans.

 

“This is more your fault than it is mine.” Adam replies.

 

They lay as they are for a minute when Adam shifts his position in an attempt to get up but ultimately fails. “Are you going to get off me?”

 

Yang thinks about this for a half a minute. "I don't know. Your back is pretty comfortable." She wiggles a little bit to a little more comfortable, earning an annoyed scoff. They continue to lay there for another minute when Adam comes up with a solution to their bed problem.

 

"Yang." Adam calmly says, grabbing Yang's attention. "How about you get off of me so WE can get the mattresses off the bunks and put them side by side on the ground. That way we can sleep without playing a dangerous game of tug of war?”

 

"Only if you answer one question honestly."

 

Adam considers this for a moment. "Okay ask away."

 

"Why destroy a kingdom?" Yang asks bluntly.

 

“What?”

 

“I asked why does the White Fang wants to destroy a kingdom.” Yang repeats herself while holding back the fact that she wanted to ask about his relationship with Blake but feels that she would get answer that would force her to reveal her actual relationship with Blake.

 

"What makes you ask that?" Adam asks, choosing his words carefully.

 

"Considering that the start of Vytal Festival being so close and the fact you guys were planning on using a train to breach the city to allow the Grimm in. We both know that the Grimm will kill humans and Faunus alike given the chance unless the White Fang teaches its members that the Grimm won't harm the Faunus." Yang explains. "So I'll ask again. Why destroy a kingdom? Especially since the kingdom you’re targeting is the most progressive and Faunus friendly of the four kingdoms."

 

Adam opens his mouth to say something but he closes it immediately afterwards to think about his next words carefully. After a couple moments, Adam speaks up. “To show the world that the Faunus are superior to humans by earning respect through fear.”

 

Yang gets off of Adam, helping him up in the process and sits on the bottom bunk wary of his answer. “Well you guys certainly got the fear part down but not so much the respect part.”

 

Adam heavily sighs when he can’t find the words to refute that statement. So, he begins lifting the top bunk’s mattress up and Yang gets up to help maneuver it to the middle of the cell then they do the same to the lower bunk’s mattress. They climb onto the mattresses, laying on their sides back to back and they try to get some sleep.

 

As Adam lays on his mattress, he think of ways on how he and his cell are going progress through the future but each plan he comes up with ends in failure and him seeing the boy crying over his parent's bodies. Meanwhile, Yang is deep in her thoughts on how she is going to proceed with her plan but her mind keeps straying to questions on Blake and Weiss' relationship. Eventually they fall into an uneasy asleep filled with dreams of unwanted memories of the past and hard to swallow possibilities for the future.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Feedback and comments of any sort is very much appreciated. It would help me gauge how well I am doing and allow me to see if I missed any mistakes I unknowingly made when writing.


	4. Dreams and Fast Approaching Crossroads

Ozpin gently stirs his mug of steaming tea as he watches a recording of a security feed from the Vale Detention Center on his computer with great interest in his office at Beacon Academy. On screen, he watches Adam and Yang being escorted through the holding cells when General Ironwood storms into the office.

 

“Ozpin, we need to talk.” Ironwood angrily states, pointing a finger towards Ozpin.

 

“Mhmm.” Ozpin replies, taking a sip from his mug without taking his eyes off the screen as the police captain shuts the cell door behind Adam and Yang.

 

“This is serious, Oz. You lied to me about the Mt. Glenn mission and look at what happened to Vale as a result.” Ironwood states, trying to grab Ozpin’s full attention. “The city has become a powder keg with a new hate group running amok, Grimm running loose, and the police, along with my army, are stretched thin.”

 

Ozpin lets out a small sigh as he pauses the recording and sets down his mug onto the desk as Ironwood walks up to the desk. “James, I did not lie to you about the Mt. Glenn mission.”

 

“I seriously have a hard time believing that after learning that the ground just magically opened up, allowing a 15 year old huntress-in-training to discover the EXACT location of the base and kickoff the events that led up the Breach.” Ironwood snaps, throwing up his arms in disbelief.

 

“How were we supposed to know that the ground would give way underneath Miss Rose’s feet?” Ozpin retorts. The general opens his mouth to reply but he closes it when he can’t an answer to that question.

 

 

“James, the intel we had only says that there was a base somewhere on Mt. Glenn and the mission was supposed to be recon mission where Dr. Oobleck and Team RWBY were supposed to recon the area, find the base, then report its location to me so your forces can take it out.” Ozpin states.

 

“But that didn’t happen.” Ironwood replies.

 

“I know.” Ozpin quietly replies. “But at least we got lucky that this happened when it did instead of during the Vytal Festival and that Roman decided to toy with Miss Rose instead of taking her hostage to use her against the others.” Ozpin says, putting things into perspective.

 

Hearing this, Ironwood visibly deflates with a sigh and moves past the desk to stare out the massive window behind it as the night descends onto Vale below. “You’re right, Oz. I’m sorry for my outburst.”

 

“It’s okay, James. It is quite understandable given how ridiculous the events leading up to the Breach sound.”

 

“Thanks.” Ironwood replies, glancing over his shoulder and catching glimpse of the computer screen. “What are you watching?”

 

“Fate moving in a mysterious way.” Ozpin simply replies, unpausing the recording. The two them watch as Adam and Yang get into an argument.

 

“Is that Adam Taurus and Yang Xiao Long?” Ironwood asks as Adam and Yang angrily climb onto the bunks beside them.

 

“It is indeed the leader of the local White Fang Cell and the partner of his ex-partner.” Ozpin replies as Adam accidently rolls off his bunk, taking Yang with him.

 

“What does this mean?“ Ironwood asks “And don’t you mean the figurehead installed by the cell’s true leader, Andre Felt, right?”

 

“I’m not sure that is correct but for better or for worse this means something interesting is about to happen.”

 

“Oz, if you ask me not to pursue the White Fang because of this…” Ironwood begins.

 

“Which is why I am not going to ask you to do that.”

 

“You aren’t?”

 

“James, you said it yourself that the situation in the city is a powder keg waiting to explode. You not going after the White Fang will not only raise suspicions among the remaining White Fang members, it will also ignite the powder keg.”

 

Ironwood nods in agreement. “Then I better get back out there then.”

 

As Ironwood turns and leaves, Ozpin turns his attention back to the recording to see that Adam and Yang are now sleeping back to back in the middle of their cell. Yang looks like she is worried about something in her dreams while Adam looks like he is afraid of something in his dreams.

 

The next day, Adam wakes up slowly finding that he is surprisingly comfortable despite the uneasy dreams from the previous night. He wiggles little bit to get even more comfortable when he hears a steady heartbeat and soft breathing coming from his pillow. Looking up, he sees Yang slowly waking up as her lilac eyes slowly open up, making them both realize that he and Yang somehow entangled themselves into a cuddle in their sleep. They quickly detangle themselves and try to put as much distance between themselves as possible but the handcuffs, and ultimately their shoulders too, painfully remind them that they are still bound together by the wrists.

 

They rub their shoulders while giving the pair of handcuffs dirty looks as their half asleep brains remember the current situation they're in and why. They shoot a quick glare at each other and decide that it is too early in the day to restart their bickering. So they attempt fix their appearances to the best of their abilities to hide the fact that they accidentally slept together.

 

While they are awkwardly twisting and turning, a prison guard appears in front of the cell and taps on the bars to get their attention. "Good morning, you two. It's time to check out of the 5 star luxury hotel affectionately known as the Vale Detention Center. Now would you kindly put your hands against the wall where I can see them?”

 

Adam and Yang do as they’re told as the guard opens up their cell and goes to handcuff them but is surprised to see a pair of handcuffs already on them. So he begins escorting Adam and Yang down through the eerily silent hallway past the large holding cells filled with sleeping inmates and into the reception area that is now empty except for a couple of new inmates and some bored looking guards.

 

While they are going down the hallway, Yang mutters a string of curses after realizing that she never got a chance to tell Ruby when she was heading back to the dorm. Adam hears this and realizes that he has to explain to Andre, and possibly Cinder, why he didn’t return to the hideout till the next day without letting him know that he spent the night in jail.

 

When they reach the processing desk, they slam their handcuffed wrists down onto the desk, making it clear of what they want to the startled guard manning the desk. The guard withers under their combined glares as he fumbles with the key to the handcuffs, which he opens after several failed attempts. Once free, Adam and Yang move to opposite sides of the desk and fill out any paperwork that comes with their release from jail and retrieve their weapons, wallets, and scrolls.

 

Adam and Yang maintain a mask of calmness as they walk towards the exit while keeping a healthy amount of distance between themselves. As they get closer to the exit, an idea pops into Yang's head when she remembers why she was in the city in the first place.

 

"This isn't over." Adam says as soon as they're outside.

 

"Of course this isn't over." Yang responds with a mischievous smirk as she suddenly gets closer to Adam. "Give me your scroll."

 

"What for?" Adam asks warily.

 

"So we can exchange contact info so that I can send you info on where we can LEGALLY settle this with very little outside interference." Yang explains as she turns on her scroll.

 

Adam agrees before fishing out his scroll from his pocket and hands it to Yang who immediately enters the contact into their scrolls along with a test call to make sure everything works. Yang tosses Adam's scroll back to him.

 

"You better not lose or destroy that scroll. I won't respond to any unknown numbers and I'll assume you chickened out." Yang states before wincing at the number of missed calls and text messages she has from her team.

 

"I wouldn't dare miss out on an opportunity like this one." Adam confidently boasts before he winces at all of his missed calls and text messages from Andre.

 

"Then I'll see later." Yang says as she turns away and heads towards the nearest airship station.

 

"You can count on that." Adam mutters to himself as turns the other way towards the White Fang's hideout.

 

Stepping onto an airship bound for Beacon Academy, Yang plans her next encounter with Adam would go with high hopes that the place she has in mind is available. But as she plans, her mind wanders to the worrying nightmare she had last night.

 

_Yang flits about Team RWBY’s dorm room, preparing for her date with Blake. Digging into her drawers, Yang pulls out the perfect outfit and puts it on when suddenly Blake walks into the room._

_“H-Heya Blakey.” Yang greets nervously._

_“Oh there you are, Yang. I’ve been looking for you.” Blake says._

_“You have? Why?” Yang asks a bit worried. “Our date is only couple of hours away.”_

_“We need to break up.”_

_“WHAT!? Why?”_

_“Yang, what we have right now isn’t working out.”_

_“Is it because of something I did?”_

_“No, Yang. It’s because I’m in love with Weiss. Always have been.” Blake answers regretfully, shocking Yang even further._

_Yang opens her to continue questioning but Blake just simply says. “I should go,” after checking scroll and turns to leave the room. She chases after Blake but she trips on the doorway, falling face first onto the ground._

_Yang picks herself off the ground and suddenly finds that he is in the living room of her house in Patch. Looking around confused, Yang hears familiar humming from the kitchen. Cautiously stepping into the kitchen, Yang is overjoyed to see her stepmother, Summer Rose, mixing together the ingredients for cookie._

_“Mom!” Yang calls out as she rushes over to scoop the shorter woman into crushing hug._

_“Yang!” Summer squeaks, tapping Yang’s shoulder to signal to her to let go before she crushes her._

_“Sorry about that, Mom.” Yang sheepishly apologizes after setting Summer down. “I missed you and I couldn’t help myself when I saw you.”_

_“It’s okay, Yang. I understand.” Summer sweetly says. “I just made a batch of cookies and am in the middle of prepping the second. Take some before I tell Ruby about them._

_Yang eagerly takes a few cookies when suddenly someone knock loudly on the front door. Summer stops what she is doing and quickly walks up to the front door and answers it. Peeking out from the kitchen, Yang sees a woman in the door way with a wild of black hair similar to Yang’s own hair and piercing crimson red eyes. “Summer, the hour of the mission is upon us. We need to hurry.”_

_“Already?” Summer asks and the mysterious woman simply nods in response._

_Summer sighs and invites the woman into the house then goes into her and Taiyang’s bedroom to retrieve her gear. Yang looks at the date on a nearby calendar to see if this mission was preplanned or not but looking at the current reminds her of the date’s significance. With wide eyes, Yang sprints to her parent’s bedroom and arrives just as Summer exits the room._

_“Mom, we need to talk!” Yang quickly states._

_“What is it, sweetie?”_

_“It’s about the mission you are about to go on. You’re going to die on this mission and as a result, Dad is going to shut down completely leaving me and Ruby alone.” Yang desperately explains. “Please don’t go.”_

_A sad smirk appears on Summer’s face. “Yang… I’m sorry but I need to go on this mission.”_

_“W-Why?” Yang asks with worry clear in her voice._

_“This is an important mission that will not only guarantee your safety but also all of Remnant’s safety too.” Sumer calmly explains._

_“N-No!” Yang says, refusing to budge._

_“I’m sorry, Yang. But I have to.” Summer says, pushing past Yang and into the living room._

_Yang starts to chase after Summer but something tugs on her right sleeve from behind, preventing her from going any further. Looking behind her, Yang discovers her 5 year old little sister Ruby clutching her sleeve with a scared expression on her face that breaks Yang’s heart instantly. “Y-Yang are y-you going to leave too?”_

_Yang’s heart break even more at the question as she kneels down to hug her sister. “N-No I’m not.”_

 

The feel of the airship as it arrives at Beacon Academy shakes Yang out of the memory and she exits as quickly as possible to try to return the dorm for a quick shower but she is immediately discovered by an incredibly unhappy Ruby standing near the airship dock with her arms crossed and impatiently tapping her foot in the ground. Yang nervously gulps and hopes that the story she came up with is convincing enough as she approaches her little sister.

 

"Yang, where have you been since we last talked" Ruby sternly asks.

 

"Saving a poor woman from a pair of beowolves then blowing off steam in Vale."

 

"In Junior's club?"

 

"No!" Yang sharply replies. "I was at the gym Dad and I used go to. Then I booked a room at a nearby inn and stayed the night when I realized how late it was when I was done."

 

"Uh huh." Ruby simply says. "And why didn't you let me or the rest of team know?"

 

"My uh... scroll died and didn't get a chance to charge until after I got into the room." Yang nervously replied while trying to keep a straight face while Ruby continues to glare at her. "And I fell right asleep the second I got into the bed."

 

Ruby holds her glare for a couple more seconds but relents soon afterwards with a heavy sigh.

 

"At least you're safe." Ruby says, pulling Yang into a warm hug.

 

Tension that Yang never knew she had melts away allowing a soft smile to appear on her face as she returns Ruby's hug. "Me too, sis."

 

"So...   did you get the Blake-itis out of your system?" Ruby asks as she pulls out of the hug.

 

"Yeah I think so."

 

"Good. For a second there you were getting close to how you were when you discovered the joys of clubbing."

 

"I- I wasn't that bad." Yang denies.

 

"Yang, you practically lived in the local nightclubs whenever you weren’t at school or at home and nothing else. Dad, Uncle Qrow, and I had to stage an intervention when the rumors became too big to ignore and then there was the fact that you didn’t come home for three days straight at one point."

 

"I uh... yeah, I see where you're coming from." Yang sighs remembering those particular months, all of the false rumors that flew around at the time, and huge fight she had with their dad and uncle.

 

"Good to hear. Let’s return to the dorm room so you can apologize for your actions to Blake. She and Weiss were there when I left." Ruby announces with Yang nodding in agreement. As both of them walk through the nearly empty courtyard, a question pops into Yang's head.

 

"Rubes, how long have you known about Blake and Weiss?"

 

"A couple of months. I was in the dorm's bathroom when I heard them burst through the dorm's door passionately kissing each other without realizing I was in the bathroom." Ruby explains. "The bathroom door isn't as thick as you think it is."

 

"Huh."

 

They enter the dorm and quickly make their way towards their dorm room. When they arrive, Yang carefully opens to avoid getting a lecture for disturbing Weiss' studying but they are greeted by a seemingly empty room. Yang and carefully tiptoes into the room and soon afterwards they find bow-less Blake protectively hugging a smiling Weiss from behind as they sleep on Weiss' bunk.

 

Ruby makes an 'aww' face as she pulls out scroll while Yang half grins in defeat. Yang puts a hand on top of Ruby's scroll, lowering it as she shakes her head. Ruby gives her a look to ask why and Yang responds with a taking a picture gesture then points to her ears. Ruby nods in agreement while putting away her scroll then makes a writing something down gesture and points towards her messy study desk. Yang gives her a thumbs up and puts a finger over her mouth to remind her to be quiet.

 

Ruby sits at her desk, carefully cleaning it then pulls out a large drawing board and begins sketching a new weapon design. Yang in the meantime, heads over to her bookshelf and picks up Summer's first edition copy of Tiger in the Ballroom. A small smile of sad nostalgia appears on her face when she softly strokes the novel's cover before she climbs onto her bunk to begin rereading it.

 

As this is happening, Adam's journey back to the White Fang hideout was largely uneventful except for a run-in with a pair human racists who decided to threaten Adam despite Blush & Wilt being in plain view. He does the police a favor by knocking the two fools out and hold them long enough for the police to arrive and arrest them.

 

Along the way, he thinks of ways to draw out Blake once he captures Yang after they "settle" things between them. But each time he thinks of Blake, he remembers the moment they parted ways, causing him to cringe. The memory reminds him of the nightmare he had last night.

 

_Adam heaves from the exhaustion brought on by the usage of semblance as the massive spider-like Schnee Dust Company robot lies in front of him split in half and crackling with electricity. He grins victoriously at the sight and turns towards his partner, Blake, but he doesn’t find her where he expects her to be. Looking around wildly, he finds her on the next car and the sad, regretful look on her face causes Adam’s blood to run cold._

_“Blake… no.” He says before rushing over to where she stands._

_But she slices the connection between the two cars of the cargo train in half before Adam has the chance to reach her. “Goodbye,” is all she says as the gap between them widens further and further. Before Adam has chance to respond the robot explodes, launching Adam off the train and turning the world black._

_When Adam opens his eyes, he finds himself not on the SDC cargo train anymore but in the town square of the town he grew up in. Getting up off the ground, Adam sees that it is currently nighttime and the town looks exactly like it was when he last saw it. Suddenly, an angry mob of humans marches past where he is standing in the direction of where his parents’ house is. Fearing the worst, he sprints after the mob, hoping to make to the house before the mob does._

_Predictably, he arrives at the house before the mob does and a wave of nostalgia hits him when he enters the house. Everything inside is how he remembers and in the living room is his father acting out scenes that he comes up with as his mother sits at her desk typing away on her typewriter putting the acted out scenes onto paper_

_“Mom! Dad!” Adam calls out, grabbing his parents’ attention._

_“Oh, Adam. You’re home.” His father says, surprised to see Adam._

_“Why are you back so soon?” His mother asks curiously. “I thought you wanted to hang out with your friends today.”_

_“There’s a mob heading this way and they want to kill you.” Adam quickly explains. “We need to escape now.”_

_“And go where?”_

_“Anywhere. Don’t worry, I’ll protect you.”_

_His mother light heartedly chuckles at the statement. “Oh little calf, look at you being the alpha of the house. I feel safer already.”_

_“What?” Adam incredulously asks. Looking down, he sees that Blush has turned into a toy gun and Wilt turned to a toy sword. Panicking, he looks at a nearby mirror and discovers that he is his 8 year old self again. Suddenly something starts banging on the front door and windows and turning around reveals the fact that the mob has reached the house. But instead of seeing angry humans, Adam sees angry Faunus’ glaring at him through the windows._

_Adam looks back to his parent with a fearful expression. “Mom… Dad…”_

_His parents calmly walk over to him and pull him into a loving embrace. “It’s going to be okay, little calf.” Hi mother says soothingly._

_“B-But…” Adam begins to say as the front door and windows finally break._

_“Ssshhh… Everything is going to be okay, Adam.” His father says as the mob gets closer and closer._

 

Shaking his head of the memory, Adam finds himself in front of the hideout’s entrance and with a small huff, he enters the warehouse prepared to face to Andre. Once inside, he sees several grunts going about their morning duties but no Andre in sight. Continuing on deeper into the warehouse, Adam finds Andre sitting in the command center watching the news, hunched over and anxiously tapping his right foot.

 

 _“In other news, hate crimes against the Vale’s Faunus population are at an all-time high ever since the event perpetrated by the White Fang that authorities dubbed “The Breach” occurred. Thanks to the joint effort of the Vale Police Department and the Atlesian Military, these crimes have steadily decreased due to most of these crime being committed by members of a newly arisen hate group calling themselves, Humanity’s Shield-”_ The news anchor, Lisa Lavender, explains before Andre turns off the TV he was watching the news on.

 

“Is it as bad as they say it is out there, Adam?” Andre asks worriedly.

 

“And more.” Adam replies.

 

Andre sighs heavily in response. “Start from the beginning.”

 

For the next few minutes, Adam recounts all that saw and heard while leaving the part where he found Blake’s current partner and the fact he got arrested as well. During this, Andre’s face twists and darkens as he tries to digest the information being told asks an occasional question for clarification. When Adam is done with his recounting, Andre curses underneath his breath and gets up from where he was sitting to take a few deep breaths.

 

“Andre, has any of our contacts or other bases within the city made contact with us yet?” Adam asks once Andre has calmed down.

 

“Only the ones beyond the city limits.”

 

Adam sighs. “Andre, I want you to get all of the members who can easily pass as human together and end them out to into the city to reestablish contact with the others. I want to know if they have any new information about the situation in Vale.”

 

“Yes sir.” Andre salutes. “What about our business associates?”

 

“Don’t worry about them for now. I’ll figure something out.” Adam replies and Andre nods in return, turning to exit the planning area to gather the required members.

 

Adam lets out an uneasy sigh and looks up at a bulletin board that has the original plan on display. Looking at it, Yang’s question echoes through Adam’s head. _‘Why destroy a kingdom?’_

 

He shakes his head of the thought and heads to the manager’s office to beginning planning his next few moves. Upon entering the office, he sits behind his desk, resting Blush& Wilt against the side and rub his temples in frustration as he weighs the pros and cons of the White Fang’s continued partnership with Cinder and her allies. Adam decides he needs to keep tabs on Cinder and begins looking through personnel files but he stops when he realizes she knows all of faces of each and every member under his command.

 

Picking up the receiver of the still functioning landline phone leftover from the pre-CCTS days, Adam dials of someone who Cinder does not know and is perfect the job. On the third ring, the person answer their scroll. “Hello?”

 

“Ilia?”

 

“A-Adam!? Why are you calling?”

 

“I have job I need you for.”

 

“What do you need me to do?”

 

“All in due time, Ilia. But first, how soon can you come to Vale?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Feedback and comments of any sort is very much appreciated. It would help me gauge how well I am doing and allow me to see if I missed any mistakes I unknowingly made when writing.


	5. Apologies and Surprises

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Emergency Author’s Note: I’m sorry to the 90ish people and all of the followers of this story who read the original Chapter 5. I deleted the original chapter and replaced it with the revised version because I wasn't entirely satisfied how the original turned out. So when I was going over how Chapter 6 was going to play out, I had an epiphany the first part of the original and the first part of Chapter 6 would flow together and setup the second part of the original chapter 5 seamlessly. So silver lining, Chapter 6 is now half way done with a slight rewrite planned to adapt it to the new changes. I hope you guys like what I have done with the new Chapter 5.

A sleepy Weiss gently stirs in her comfortable position in her girlfriend’s protective embrace when she hears the telltale sound of a book’s page turning. With a knowing smile, she shifts her position ever so slightly to look up only to find Blake still asleep with her cute kitty ears slightly twitching as she peacefully dreams and Weiss’ smiling face morphs into one of worry. Then she hears the sound of someone writing with a pencil followed by the sound of said pencil breaking and a familiar voice whispering a reaction.

 

Weiss sits up quickly to discover Ruby sitting at her study desk in front of a drawing board that has a pair of diagrams of a heavily modified/customized Mauser C96 that appears to transform into a kō-wakizashi and a circular drum magazine on it. Looking towards Yang and Blake’s bunks, she sees Yang laying on her back reading a book on her bunk and Weiss lets out an unhappy groan at what has happened.

 

"Weiss~, why did you suddenly get up?" Blake asks, still three quarters asleep, capturing Yang and Ruby's attention.

 

"Morning, you two." Yang says happily, putting down her book and waking Blake up fully to realize the situation she and Weiss are in.

 

“Y-Yang… Ruby…, how long have you been there?” Weiss hesitantly asks looking between the two of them.

 

Yang checks her scroll. “A couple hours.”

 

“Oh.” Weiss simply says. “I… I guess you guys want an explanation, right?”

 

“That would be preferable since I would like to know why I have been unknowingly acting like an ass for past year.” Yang replies after she and Ruby nod in agreement and sit down on Blake’ bunk to face Blake and Weiss.

 

So… what do you want to know first?” Weiss asks nervously.

 

“When did you two become a couple?” Yang asks without hesitation.

 

“A couple days after our run-in with the White Fang at the docks.” Blake says.

 

“We were having a small argument due to a slip of a tongue on my part and I accidently asked her to teach what it means to be a Faunus, without realizing what I asked.” Weiss explains.

 

“Of course, I said yes after couple moments of standing there shocked.” Blake further explains, giving Weiss a soft smile and taking ahold of her hand. “And the rest is history.”

 

Yang grins at the interaction and leans back, satisfied with their answer.

 

“But why hide it?” Ruby asks

 

Weiss shifts in her spot uncomfortably at the question. ”It’ because of my father.” Weiss finally says after a couple minutes of twisting her face trying to find the best way to put her answer.

 

Ruby frowns at this. “What about Adam and the White Fang?”

 

“Yes they are a part of the reason why but when compared to my father, they are much smaller of a problem.”

 

“How?”

 

Weiss takes a deep breath. "My father is a cruel man who sees his own children as tools to further his own goals, is very good at being the ruthless businessman, and despises the Faunus with a burning passion." Weiss says with enough venom in her to quickly kill a Goliath Grimm.

 

“Before I came here, father didn’t want me to attend any huntsman academy whatsoever and tried his hardest to convince/prevent me from leaving his sight. Which is how I got this.” Weiss points to the scar over her left eye. “To show me that the world of huntsman was a place I didn’t belong in, he had a captured Geist Grimm possess a giant suit of armor and he forced me to fight and defeat it as a test.”

 

The rest of Team RWBY stare at Weiss shocked at what she just revealed as she continues with her explanation. “So before Blake and I became a couple, my biggest worry was that if I wasn’t the best he would invent some sort of lie that he would use as an excuse to pull me out of Beacon and keep me under his thumb as a puppet for the rest of my life. But now that Blake and I are together…” Weiss looks away as she trails off as Blake reaches around her and pulls her into a comforting one armed hug.

 

“It’s okay, Weiss.” Blake softly whispers, earning a small smile and a thank you from Weiss.

 

Weiss takes another deep breath to calm herself. “If my father were to somehow find out about our relationship no matter how tiny the piece of evidence is, there is no telling how badly he will react.”

 

Weiss sighs. “Not only will he pull me out of Beacon, he will most likely disown me and crush my dreams of taking over the SDC from his destructive grasp and all of the planning I’ve done for it but what will happen to Blake will be much worse. The best case scenario is that he simply throws her in prison for her history with the White Fang and the worst case scenario is that he would do all could to make her life a living hell.”

 

“Planning?” Blake asks, clearly confused why Weiss didn’t mention this before.

 

“Oh right, I haven’t told or shown anyone this yet.” Weiss says to herself.

 

She gets off the bed and goes over to her study desk, opening one of its drawers then brings out an expensive looking laptop. Sitting back down next to Blake, Weiss opens the laptop and reveals some sort of simulation program running on it.

 

“Since a little bit before school started, I convinced my father to send me the latest complete company financial reports as a part of preparation for taking over the SDC and I have been using these reports to create several extensively detailed simulations of how much the reforms I have planned are going to cost the company along with how long it would take to recover from those losses.” Weiss explains, clicking through various areas of the program, leaving the rest of team RWBY to stare at her in amazement.

 

“So Yang, Ruby, I’m deeply sorry for not trusting you two enough by keeping our relationship a secret instead of telling you much, much sooner. And Blake, I’m sorry for forcing you to agree with me, considering what Yang was doing to get your attention.” Weiss apologizes, bowing her head towards rest of the team who sits in heavy silence taking in what Weiss just explained and wrapping their heads around the implications after Weiss closes the laptop and stows it in safe spot on her bed.

 

“I accept your apology and can see why you want to hide your relationship and why you barely distrust me when I’m sober, Weiss.” Yang solemnly says after a minute of heavy silence.

 

“Thank you Yang for understa…” Weiss trails off as her face contorts with confusion. “Err… What did you say, Yang?”

 

“Uh… ‘I can see why you want to hide your relationship and why you barely distrust me when I’m sober, Weiss’.” Yang repeats

 

Weiss visibly becomes even more pale. “Yang, how long have you known about us?”

 

“Since yesterday afternoon.” Yang replies nonchalantly. “The door didn’t close all the way when Blake suddenly pulled you into the room.”

 

“W- What about you, R- Ruby?”

 

"A couple of months when you guys had that make out session in the dorm before I interrupted you by walking out of the bathroom." Ruby casually says. "I only knew because I heard you kissing through the bathroom door and the fact that you two were blushing up a storm while reading your textbooks upside down kind of gave it away too."

 

Blake and Weiss blush at the memory then blush even harder at the realization that they were more obvious than they thought. Ruby and Yang lightheartedly chuckle at the sight.

 

"Well I guess belated congratulations for you two becoming a couple are in order then." Yang announces once Weiss and Blake recover.

 

"Y-You aren't mad at me for keeping this a secret from you and not trusting you enough?" Weiss asks incredulously and Yang chuckles at this.

 

"How can I be mad at you when seeing you and Blake together brings such a rare smile to your face? Right, Rubes?" Yang says with a wide grin on her face.

 

"Agreed!" Ruby excitedly replies, nodding her head.

 

Weiss and Blake sit there shocked at easily Yang accepted their relationship. Seeing this, Yang decides to punch the lancer Grimm's nest with a mischievous grin on her face. "What's the matter Weiss princess? Blake got your tongue?"

 

It takes a moment for Weiss to process what Yang said and anger bubbles up as her right eye twitches with anger while Blake simply glares as Yang slowly makes her way towards the dorm’s entrance. Yang escapes through the doorway and Weiss gives chase. “Get back here, Yang Xiao Long!”

 

Ruby and Blake shake their heads at this but can’t help chuckle knowing that the heavy atmosphere in the room has dissipated thanks to Yang. Ruby gets off the bed and goes over to her desk to inspect the weapon blueprint, catching Blake’s attention.

 

“What’s this supposed to be, Ruby?” Blake asks, closely inspecting the blueprint herself.

 

“A backup weapon in case I ever lose my Crescent Rose again.” Ruby replies as she begins jotting down a list of parts onto a notepad.

 

“Huh. Have you thought of a name for it yet?” Blake asks thoughtfully.

 

“Rose Thorn.” Ruby proudly answers with a smirk before she starts going over the list to see if she missed anything.

 

“It fits nicely.” Blake says while Ruby prepare to leave the dorm.

 

“Well, I’m heading out into the city to see if any of the weapon shops have the part I need.” Ruby announces.

 

“Wouldn’t ordering online be better and safer?”

 

“True but then I would miss out on sweet deals, potential upgrades for my Crescent Rose, and potential information on where to find the parts I need.” Ruby answers as she attaches Crescent Rose to her lower back.

 

“Be safe then.” Blake says as Ruby leaves the dorm.

 

Moments after Ruby left, an out of breath Yang bursts into the dorm and quickly closes the door behind, startling Blake in the process.

 

"Phew. I think I lost her." Yang pants as she bends over to catch her breath. "Heya Blakey."

 

Blake simply looks at Yang unimpressed. "Yang, what are you doing?"

 

"Losing Weiss' pursuit and coming to find you afterwards." Yang replies with grin. "I'm surprised I found you so easily."

 

"What for?"

 

"To ask a question that popped into my head when Weiss was chasing me."

 

Blake sighs, mentally preparing herself for whatever Yang is about to ask. “What is it?”

 

“Why didn’t you return my affections or say something about them before you and Weiss started dating? Yang solemnly asks, catching Blake off guard.

 

Blake opens and closes her mouth like a fish out of water then quickly composes herself. “It’s because…”She takes a deep breath and a guilty look appears on her face. “It’s because you reminded me of Adam a bit too much for my liking.”

 

Yang opens her mouth to react but Blake holds up her hand to signal to her to wait. “Before you say anything, you are very different from him and this was from early on in the school year, a couple months after I left him on that SDC Cargo train.”

 

“Oh.” Yang’s face falls a bit at this.

 

“Yang, when we first met, I was still paranoid that he was going to find me then drag me to a nearby White Fang camp and seeing you become furious at that Ursa for cutting off a strand of your hair, reminded me little of him.” Yang cringes at this fact as Blake continues on. “Though as I got to know you better, I saw that you were a lot different than him and that eased my mind considerably. But at the same time, I saw a couple of things that remind of him like being overprotective or being quick to anger, made me more uncomfortable than I would have liked. Though given enough time to become ok with knowing that and if Weiss and I didn’t get together then maybe you and I could’ve…” Blake trails off, looking away guiltily.

 

“Could’ve gotten together instead at some point? “ Yang asks.

 

“Yeah.”

 

Yang sighs heavily. “Weiss’ stubborn attitude in the beginning and seeing the White Fang working with Torchwick certainly didn’t help with your paranoia either, right?”

 

“Yeah it certainly didn’t.” Blake replies sadly before sighing heavily as well. “Yang, I’m sorry that I kept turning you down without ever telling the real reasons why.”

 

“I accept your apology, Blake.” Yang softly says, understanding the reasoning behind Blake’s explanation and patting Blake on the shoulder.

 

Blake goes to refute how easily Yang accepted her explanation but stops when she sees the understanding look on Yang’s face which brings a small sad smile to her own face. “Thank you Yang for understanding.”

 

“Your very welcome, Blake.” Yang says sincerely.

 

“Now if you’ll excuse me, I have an angry girlfriend still looking for you to calm down and cuddle.” Blake says as she leaves the dorm a bit lighter than before.

 

Moments after Blake leaves and when Yang is sure that she is alone, a slightly hurt look appears on her face as she pulls out her scroll and brings up Adam's contact info. Looking at it, she begins rethinking her original plan of defeating Adam to win Blake's heart alongside gaining fame and glory. “They already have enough on their plate as it is. They don’t need know about this.”

 

An hour after her airship landed at the Vale International Airport, Ilia walks through the heart of Vale, taking in the sights as she slowly makes her way towards to the meeting point Adam specified in his call. So far, she is generally impressed on how different Vale is from her home kingdom of Atlas and the city of Menagerie. Everything from the sights of Faunus and humans mingling with each other in a relaxed manner to the mildly warm snow/sand free look of the city, had taken her by surprise since she was expecting something else entirely.

 

Along the way, she can’t help notice the rather heavy presence of police, Atlesian soldiers, and their robots patrolling throughout the city. This makes Ilia worried about getting caught after seeing what Adam’s cell of the White Fang on local news channel while she was still on the airship. Increasing her pace through the city, she comes across a small courtyard where a human standing on top of what appears to be a makeshift stage speaking out to any passerby about how Vale human citizens should do their part in reporting any suspicious Faunus activity and that some group called Humanity’s Shield is looking out for them.

 

An unhappy groan escapes Ilia’s throat when she hears the man’s speech. She quickly rushes by the courtyard, trying her best to ignore what is being said. A couple minutes later, Ilia comes across a female cat Faunus and a male human handing out flyers.

 

“Excuse me, miss!” the cat Faunus calls out to Ilia as she approaches the pair. “Can I interest you in taking one our flyers?”

 

“Sure you can.” Ilia replies, taking an offered flyer the woman. “What are you advertising?”

 

“We are trying to convince people to join our group so we can push back against the rampant racism that seems to be everywhere these days.” The man proudly says.

 

“Huh.” Ilia says. “I would love stay and chat about this but I have somewhere I need to be.”

 

“Be safe out, miss.” The woman calls out while waving goodbye as Ilia walks away.

 

Ilia nearly trips over herself in surprise when she sees that the flyer is a recruitment flyer for a group called Citizens against the White Fang and Racism with a date and time for a group meeting. Ilia folds up the flyer and stuffs into a pocket before hurrying along towards her destination.

 

Passing by a nearby alley after a few minutes of nearly jogging her way through the city, quick movement in the corner of her eye catches her attention and she turns her head to look at it. But she sees nothing and continues on her way when suddenly someone collides into her with an oomph. Looking around for the person she ran into, she finds a short (small?) girl with black hair that fades into crimson and what looks like a red hooded cape along with a rather cute black combat skirt, on the ground in front of her.

 

"Oh I'm sorry. I wasn't paying attention to where I was going." Ilia apologizes to the girl as she helps her up off the ground.

 

"It's ok. I wasn't paying much attention either." The girl replies, looking up at Ilia.

 

Whatever response Ilia had, dies on her tongue as she gets lost in the most beautiful pair of eyes she has ever seen looks at her. The girl continues to ramble on as Ilia stands entranced by the girl’s shimmering silver eyes, not paying attention.

 

“Helloo~?” The girl asks as she suddenly starts waving a hand in front of Ilia’s face trying to get her attention.

 

Ilia snaps back to reality with a jolt and a blush on her face. “S- Sorry about that I…” Ilia trails off when she sees the girl looking at her wide eyed and her body slightly trembling. Ilia looks down at her own body to see what happened and discovers that she unconsciously turned her skin to a flustered color.

 

“That is…” the girl begins to say as her trembling intensifies, convincing Ilia to take a step back. “SO COOL!!” the girl exclaims.

 

“What?” Is all Ilia can say to this.

 

“What type of Faunus are you? Is there a limit to how many colors you can change to? Can you do patterns?” the girl rapidly asks, barely allowing Ilia time to recover when the girl audibly gasps. “Are you a ninja?”

 

Ilia snorts a laugh at the last question causing the girl to frown. “What? Did I say something wrong?”

 

“No, no you didn’t.” Ilia says, chuckling slightly. “It’s just I’ve never had someone ask me any of that before when they met me for the first time.”

 

“How come no one would ask?” the girl asks, tilting her head to the side in confusion.

 

“Well uh… where I’m from, no one really pays attention to this sort of thing since being a Faunus is such a common thing.” Ilia nervously answers, unsure how much she wants to reveal.

 

The girl opens her mouth to say something but someone clears their throat behind Ilia to get their attention. Turning around, Ilia finds a brutish looking human man eyeing her up and down.

 

“Pardon my interruption, girlies. But I couldn’t help but overhear your conversation.” The man creepily says. “Do you if I talk to you, little girl with the curly pony tail, in private?”

 

“What about?” Ilia nervously asks, fearful of what the man might do.

 

“As a concerned citizen of Vale, I am required to ask some questions on your possible affiliation to the White Fang.” The man says with a dangerous tone of voice.

 

“O- On whose authority?” the girl stutters.

 

“The authority of Humanity’s Shield to which I am a proud member of.” The man proudly announces before he ominously looks at them. “Now are you going are going to be a good little girl and follow me or are we going to have to do this the hard way?”

 

Before either Ilia or the girl can do anything, something crashes behind the H.S. member, catching their attention. Looking in the direction of the loud noise, every sees a trash can roll out of the alley Ilia passed by earlier followed by a single Creep that turns and looks at them with glowing red eyes. The H.S. member screams and runs away as a dozen more Creeps tumble out the alley.

 

Ilia reaches for her extendable dust whip and detaches it from her belt when suddenly the girl shoots past her, drawing the red box from her back which she transforms into a scythe that is almost twice her size. For a moment, Ilia stands in awe of what she just witnessed before extending her whip and slicing two airborne Creeps that decided to launch themselves at the girl as she twirls around like a tornado, slicing up Creeps left and right. The two of them make very work of the remaining Creeps and search the area around them for more but they find none. Ilia retracts her whip when she knows for sure they’re safe as the girl runs up to her with sparkling silver eyes after collapsing her scythe into it’s compact form, catching her of guard again.

 

“Oh my gods, is your weapon a whip?” the girl excitedly asks.

 

“It’s a dust whip actually.” Ilia says, holding out her whip for the girl to see. The girl excitedly gasps and begins thoroughly inspecting the whip while giving Ilia her space.

 

“That is so cool!” the girl exclaims once her inspection is done. “You’re like Indiana Jones.”

 

“Who?” Ilia asks, clearly not recognizing the name.

 

The girl reels back with a horrified look. “Y-You don’t know who he is?”

 

“Should I?”

 

“Did your parents ever rent any movies when you were young?”

 

Ilia shakes her head no. “My parents were too poor to afford something like that and any money they saved up went to sending me off to get a proper education.”

 

The girl’s face falls a bit before it suddenly brightens up with an idea. “Then it is my duty to show you the cheesy goodness of the Joe Indy movie series.” The girl announces, striking a proud pose that Ilia finds cute.

 

Suddenly, the H.S. member returns to where Ilia and the girl with a pair of police officers trailing behind him. “Over here officers. This is where I last saw the White Fang member.”

 

“You again?!” The girl asks, scowling at the H.S. member and quickly puts herself between Ilia and the H.S. member. Once again, Ilia finds herself surprised by the girl.

 

Seeing this, the two officers look between the girl and Ilia, confused. “Sir, can you identify who is the White Fang member?”

 

The H.S. member points at Ilia. “She is the one, officers.”

 

“That’s not true.” The girl says, clearly offended by the accusation.

 

“Then why does she have that weapon on her hip then?” The H.S. member asks with a sneer.

 

“It’s because I was once attended huntsman school but was forced to quit and get a job at the local dust mine to help my parents pay off the bills.” Ilia convincingly lies to defend herself.

 

The two officers sigh deeply at the situation they found themselves in and begin taking the girl’s and Ilia’s statement on what happened to cause this situation. Ilia tells them her side of the story, making sure not to accidently reveal herself as an actual White Fang member. In response to this, the H.S. member tries to defend himself but he is ultimately arrested for harassment and wasting police resources.

 

After the police leave with the H.S. member in handcuffs, Ilia and the girl breathe a sigh of relief. The girl turns towards Ilia with a worried look. “Are you okay?”

 

“I am, thank you.” Ilia says still surprised by the girl’s actions.

 

“You sound surprised.” The girl observes.

 

“Well in my experience, people usually just stand around gawking and doing nothing when a situation like this happens.” Ilia says, trying not to sound angry.

 

“You’re very welcome then!” the girl says, feeling proud of herself. Suddenly an ominous sounding ringtone could be heard from the girl’s pocket. The girl pulls out a scroll and frowns at it.

 

“Why would Ms. Goodwitch be texting me? She mutters to herself. Upon inspecting the message, the girl looks between the general direction of Beacon Academy then at the area they are at and lets out a cute little ‘awww’. “Sorry to do this but I have to go.”

 

“It’s okay, I understand.” Ilia says with a soft smile. The girl smile back, melting Ilia heart in the process and zooms away to what Ilia assumes is the nearest airship station, leaving behind a trail of falling rose petals.

 

Ilia carefully grabs one of the petals out the air and tenderly clutches it to her thundering heart, watching the girl, she now dubs Little Rose, gets smaller and smaller in the distance. When Little Rose is completely out of sight, Ilia resumes her journey with a smile on her face and whole slew of questions for Adam.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Confessions of an Author: Don’t ask me how but somehow I managed to write the new second part of Chapter 5 under 5 hours. Writing seemed like watching a raging river of words flow from my fingertips onto the screen.  
> Original Author’s Note: I updated the summary because I felt that the old one didn’t was no longer up to par for what I have planned for the story. So feedback of any sort would be very helpful on how this chapter went with you guys.


	6. Fuel for a fire

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Annoucement: If you haven’t read the revised Chapter 5, I suggest you read that first or you are going to confused on why you are reading a revised version of the second part of the original Chapter 5.

A worried and confused Yang sits in Beacon’s auditorium, keeping Blake in between her and Weiss while all three of them are surround by equally worried and confused students. All around them, various students talk amongst themselves trying to figure why Prof. Goodwitch sent everyone a message informing them of a sudden assembly and that the student’s attendance was mandatory. Despite the worry and confusion, Yang welcomes this surprise assembly as a welcome distraction from earlier thoughts of rethinking her secret plan.

 

Looking around her, Yang looks for Ruby who hasn’t arrived yet but instead sees that there is only Beacon Academy students in the auditorium. Yang checks her scrolls to see if Ruby left her a message and discovers that she did in fact leave one saying that the airship she is on was delayed to a mechanical failure which she blames on a possible sighting of their uncle’s bird form flying away from the vicinity of the airship.

 

The auditorium’s lights dim and the stage’s lights brighten, capturing everyone’s attention while hushing them in the process. As Prof. Goodwitch walks up to the podium, Ruby sneakily sits down in between Yang and Blake.

 

Prof. Goodwitch clears her throat to get those who haven’t quieted down yet. “Good day everyone. I’m glad you all could make it here today despite the rather sudden announcement I made. I gathered everyone here to inform you of what is happening for the next two weeks.”

 

The auditorium begins murmuring amongst themselves wondering what will be happening.

 

As quickly as they started, the auditorium quiets down, allowing Prof. Goodwitch to continue speaking. “As you all know, Amity Stadium has recently arrived in Vale before the Breach occurred, signaling that the Vytal Festival is about to start.” Prof. Goodwitch dramatically pauses for a moment. “This means that the Vytal Festival & Tournament are starting next week and there will be no classes held that week to allow the teams participating in the tournament to prepare.”

 

The auditorium erupts into cheers and yeses, clearly excited for the prospect of having no classes for an entire week.

 

“Settle down everyone. I’m not done speaking yet.” Prof. Goodwitch says, hushing the excited audience. “Starting the week, after the Vytal Festival ends and all of the transfer students have returned to their respective academies, will be Finals Week. Information on what Finals Week will be is going to be announced the day before it starts. That is all and I wish you all a good rest of your day.”

 

Everyone stands there shocked before the auditorium erupts into a chorus of dramatically drawn out noes and groans. Prof. Goodwitch walks away from the podium with what looks like a satisfied smile her face. Soon afterwards, everyone either slowly or quickly filters out the auditorium in some sort of state of panic. As Team RWBY leaves, Weiss begins muttering to herself, trying to guess what topics the final exams will cover while Blake walks next to her, trying to calm her down as Yang and Ruby Walk behind them.

 

“So… how was your trip?” Yang asks.

 

“It was mostly bad.” Ruby replies, slightly bummed out.

 

“Mostly?” Yang inquires.

 

“Well, none of the few weapon shops I went to had any of the parts I needed for Rose Thorn’s construction but then I accidently bumped into this girl.” Ruby explains, blushing towards the end and capturing the rest of RWBY’s attention

 

“Oh? Do tell, Rubes.” Yang inquires some more with a teasing grin on her face

 

Ruby blushes even more then begins rapidly explaining her encounter while miming various poses accompanied by sound effects as the story goes on. But all _WBY can make out is that the girl has an awesome ponytail, cute freckles, hasn’t seen the Indiana Jones movies, and something about an encounter with a Humanity’s Shield member. Yang opens her mouth to tease her little sister but someone beats her to it.

 

“It sounds like someone has a little crush.” Says a familiar gravelly voice from behind them. Turning around they see their Uncle Qrow standing there with a teasing grin on his face.

 

“Uncle Qrow!” Ruby happily exclaims.

 

“Drunkle Qrow!” Yang happily exclaims at the same time as Ruby, earning a questioning look from Weiss.

 

Somewhere in the background, Qrow’s Semblance of bad luck alerts Emerald and Mercury to Qrow’s presence before he notices them and they make a break for their dorm when they gets a good look at him, freaking out. Yang and Ruby rush up to him and simultaneously hug him much to his chagrin. Qrow taps out after minute of near bone crushing hugging. “So kiddo, what is the name of this crush of yours so I can do Tai’s job for him?”

 

“It’s… uh….” Ruby says before she realizes that she forgot something important and drops down to her knees, shaking her fists in the air at the realization. “Noooooooooo~! I forgot to get her name.”

 

Qrow, Yang, and Blake chuckle slightly at the sight while Weiss sighs and face palms as Ruby gets off of the ground with regretful look on her face. Yang pats her on the back after Ruby dusts herself off. “It’s gonna be okay, Rubes. I’m sure you’ll run, bump, and/or trip into her into the near future. We do have the next week off thanks to the Vytal Festival.”

 

“Heh, I guess you’re right.” Ruby says with a small smile. “So what are you doing here, Uncle Qrow?”

 

“Ozpin and General Ironwood asked me to meet them today so I can’t really stay and chat” Qrow explains, earning a drawn out aw from Yang and Ruby. “But that doesn’t mean I can’t visit you guys later.”

 

“How have you been lately?” Yang asks. “We haven’t seen you in forever.”

 

“Nothing much. Just a couple missions here and there, teaching at Signal, and recharging my batteries so that I can the world’s best uncle.” Qrow strikes a confident pose with cocky smirk on his face.

 

“Um… why did Yang call you ‘Drunkle’?” Weiss asks.

 

“It’s most likely because he’s drunk all of the time.” Says an icy feminine voice, causing Weiss’ eyes to light up with excitement. Everyone turns to the sound of the voice to find a white haired, blue eyed woman in an Atlesian Specialist uniform with a striking resemblance to Weiss, standing there with her arms crossed and a scowl on her face.

 

“Winter!” Weiss exclaims.

 

“Hello Weiss.” Winter says before turning her attention to Qrow. “Mr. Branwen, if you are done lollygagging. We have a meeting to get to very soon.”

 

“What? You’re not going to give your little sister a hug and see how she’s been, Ice Queen?”

 

Winter looks at the time and sighs. “I would but we don’t have much time, Mr. Branwen.”

 

“Aw, you’re no fun.” Qrow teases.

 

“Neither is being late.” Winter quickly retorts before she turns to Weiss. “I’m sorry for this, Weiss. I’ll contact you later when I’m out of the meeting and we can catch up then.”

 

“I understand, dear sister.” Weiss nods goodbye and Winter does the same. Winter begins walking towards Ozpin’s tower and Qrow follows after saying his goodbyes.

 

As they are walking away, they unknowingly pass by Team CRDL ganging up on Velvet in secluded spot. Cardin goes to punch Velvet when she defies him but Qrow’s Semblance causes him to slip on nothing and his punch to miss completely. As Cardin falls forward, his and Velvet’s lips meet in a kiss, surprising them both. And while their lips are still connected, Qrow’s Semblance walks side by side with Coco, who is carrying her rotary cannon in its handbag form, into the secluded spot searching for Velvet and gets a good view of what happened.

 

Watching Qrow and Winter walk away, Weiss shakes with excitement as she begins walking with Blake by her side towards the dorm clearly intent on preparing for her time with Winter. Ruby follows after them as Yang lingers behind, watching Blake and Weiss subtly act as a couple.

 

"How could I have been so blind?" Yang asks herself, heavily sighing as guilt bubbles up when she sees the ever so slight widening of Weiss’ smile whenever she quickly glances at Blake. As she is walking away, she bumps into someone and she turns to the person she bumped into to see Sun.

 

"Hey Yang."

 

“Hey Sun"

 

“What's wrong Yang?” Sun asks, noticing Yang’s guilty look.

 

“Nothing much, just dealing with some stuff.”

 

Sun looks behind Yang and sees Weiss studying with Blake. He gestures to Yang to follow him to a private area before making sure that no is around and they can’t be heard. “Did you finally find out about Blake and Weiss?”

 

“Ye- wait…” Yang begins to say but she catches herself. “How do you know about them?”

 

“I was there from the beginning when they started those 'what it means to be a Faunus' sessions to when they hooked up just after the dance.”

 

“What? I thought they became a couple just after the docks incident when Weiss asked Blake to teach her about Faunus.”

 

Sun chuckles at this. "Well that may have been the exact starting point that got them where they are now but at first they didn’t realize they were attracted to each other. All of their learning about Faunus sessions leading up to the dance can be described as Blake trying to figure out if Weiss was actually genuine with learning about the Faunus willingly while Weiss possibly being oblivious with her innocent questions and possibly not realizing the effect she had on Blake."

 

"Why were you there?"

 

"Blake needed someone that she could trust to help assist in explaining some things."

 

"That must've gotten awkward real quickly."

 

"Hah, you bet. Should've seen Blake when Weiss asked her about purring then innocently asked for a demonstration."

 

Yang imagines Blake's flustered response and they both laugh at the images when another thought pops into Yang's head. "Did they realize that they were attracted to each other at the time?"

 

“I think Blake slowly realized her attraction over time and Weiss was either too inexperienced to notice or was lying to herself but I'm not exactly sure on that.” Sun replies, causing Yang to slight narrow her eyes in concern.

 

 _‘And my attempts at courting Blake must’ve driven her closer to Weiss.’_ Yang thinks before audibly asking, “Then why did they ask you and Neptune to the dance then?”

 

"Weiss asked Neptune because I think she was still enamored with Neptune at the time..." Yang finds that comment a little strange but doesn't say anything yet. "...and Blake only asked me so you didn’t get the chance to ask her to the dance." Sun leaves out the unnecessary part where Jaune encouraged Neptune to show up at the dance instead of running away because some baseless rumors he heard about Weiss. Yang thinks back to her plan to woo Blake in a moonlit romantic setting at the dance but she had it give it up when Blake never showed up.

 

“So… what happened at the dance that drove Weiss and Blake together?" Yang asks hesitantly.

 

“Well... uh..." Sun nervously rubs the back of his neck. "Neptune uh... went in for the kill, hoping that he and Weiss would start officially dating that night. But Weiss uh… didn’t take too kindly to the uh… choice of words and uh… phrasing he used and slapped him across the face, accusing him of being a slimy suitor sent by her father and for taking advantage of her trust before she ran away crying."

 

"Oh no." Yang gasps

 

"Oh no indeed." Sun says. "Luckily, Blake and I were nearby talking with each other when it happened and Blake chased after Weiss while I checked on Neptune. So after I got a shell shocked Neptune back to our dorm room, I went to check on Blake and Weiss. When I arrived, I found Blake had calmed Weiss down and was in the middle of confessing her attraction to Weiss, who said yes after a couple moments of what I assume was disbelief."

 

Yang stands there a couple of moments contemplating Sun's story. "Is Neptune okay?"

 

"Yeah, he's okay..." Sun says before adding, "...mostly. At least after Weiss apologized to him the next day and after she convinced me to stay quiet about what I saw."

 

 _‘To think I almost ruined all they had built up by shamelessly flirting with Blake without seeing the signs that she was interested in someone else.’_ Yang guiltily thinks to herself, remembering the conversation Blake had with Weiss, trying to convince her to reveal their relationship to her. At the same time, Sun thinks back to the rather awkward scroll-call to the rest of his team, telling them to get to Beacon as fast as they can as he tries to console a traumatized Neptune.

 

"That makes a lot of sense and explains a ton of things that seemed strange at the time." Yang says, feeling the earlier guilt and self-hatred dissipate as a new plan forms in her head. "Thank you, Sun for telling me this. It... feels like the rest of this weight is finally off my chest."

 

"Your welcome, Yang." Sun responds. "It's nice to finally be able to say it without having to awkwardly avoid explaining that Blake and Weiss are together part."

 

"Well I should get going." Yang announces. "And once again Sun, thank you so much. You really helped me out here." _‘More than you’ll ever know.’_

 

"No problem, Yang. Glad I could help."

 

Yang and Sun leave the secluded spot they're in and go their separate ways. As Yang heads towards the dorm, she rethinks of her motivation for her plan of doing it to win Blake’s love and affection. In its place, she decides that she going to take down or keep Adam focused on her long enough for the authorities to arrest him in order to protect Blake and Weiss from him so that they can happily continue their relationship without having to worry about him interfering.

 

Rethinking her plan, she does away with the becoming the hero of Vale part, not caring if she became one or not. Instead she replaces it with plan to move on from trying to woo Blake and try dating someone else.

 

Feeling good about her plan, she pulls out her scroll and dials the scroll number of the place she has in mind for her showdown with Adam. The scroll rings a couple of times before the other end answers. "Gym Rockers. This is Linda speaking. How may I help you?"

 

"Hello Linda, I'm Yang Xiao Long and I’m calling to see if I can reserve one of you gym's small sparring arenas."

 

"I'm sorry ma'am but due to the Breach and the Vytal Festival starting soon, all of our sparring arenas are completely booked for the week and through the weekend."

 

"Is there anything else available?" Yang asks. "My friend and I were looking to spar very soon and we tend to destroy a lot equipment in the process."

 

"Maybe ma'am. Please hold while I go ask the owner about something." Hold music starts playing and Yang leans against the wall to wait and a couple minutes later the music stops. “Hello? Ma’am are you still there?”

 

“Yes I am.”

 

“Ma’am, we have a room here at the gym with a boxing ring in it that we are planning to renovate soon. The owner has told me that it is okay for someone to reserve that room and not worry about damaging.” Linda explains. “Will that do for you?”

 

“Sounds perfect.” Yang replies.

 

“Good to hear! Though be advised that it will take some time to set up the room since it has not used for quite a while. Which means it can’t be reserved for later today.”

 

“Understandable.” Yang says, bringing up the class schedule on her scroll and finds that there are only morning classes tomorrow. “Can I reserve the room for tomorrow afternoon?”

 

“You most certainly can!” Linda cheerfully says. “What time are you thinking of?”

 

“3 o’clock in the afternoon.” Yang replies before she hears Linda typing away on her keyboard.

 

“Alright, everything looks good, ma’am. Thank you for calling Gym Rockers and have a nice rest of the day.” Linda says before hanging up.

 

Yang grins to herself then pulls up Adam’s contact info and sends a text message with all of the necessary info on where and when they are going to meet. Once the message is sent, Yang resumes her journey to the dorm to get prepared for the next day.

 

At the same time as this is happening, Ilia continues on her way towards the meetup point where she is supposed to meet Adam, as she tries to wrap her head around how the current situation in Vale came to be. But thoughts of Little Rose keep popping up causing her to question if her feelings for Little Rose are real or just a temporary product of being surprised by the actions of a girl she barely knows. Shaking her head of the questions, she continues on her way with worry thoughts.

 

As she nears the destination, she passes by an electronics store where the TV in the front window is tuned to the local news station begins showing a story about the Breach. This captures Ilia attention as the newscaster begins a brief explanation for first time viewers, explaining the dust robberies, the attempted robbery of the Vale dockyard and the reveal of Roman Torchwick’s involvement with the White Fang, Roman Torchwick’s escape in what the newscasters assume is a stolen prototype Atlesian Paladin mech, and finally the events of the Breach. Seeing this, anger slowly rises up within Ilia as she puts what she just learned and what she learned before meeting Little Rose together. She catches herself before she loses control of her Faunus trait again and begins rushing towards the destination.

 

When she arrives, Ilia discovers that the meeting point is an abandoned, boarded up restaurant on an empty street then angrily storms through the front entrance. Inside, she finds Adam, sitting in a large surprisingly clean booth with a folder on top of it, waiting for her.

 

“Adam, are you insane?” Ilia exclaims, announcing her presence.

 

“Well hello to you too, Ilia.” Adam replies as Ilia storms up to the booth. “I’m surprised that you got here so quickly, Ilia.”

 

“Spare me the pleasantries Adam and answer the question.” Ilia says.

 

“No I am not.”

 

“Are you sure?” Ilia asks incredulously as she sits down across from Adam. “Because from what I saw and learned on my way here makes me think you are.”

 

“You don’t understand.” Adam growls.

 

"Then make me understand why your cell has been working with Roman Torchwick who is HUMAN and criminal scum. Why you have control of Atlesian Paladins which haven’t been implemented into Atlesian army. And how you went from a simple train robbery to having a plan that involves destroying an entire kingdom that you executed!” Ilia challenges.

 

Adam takes a deep breath, trying hold back the anger rising up. “I was given an opportunity to have the humans all over the world fear and respect the Faunus and I took it.”

 

Ilia raises an eyebrow at this. "Did you even listen to Blake when she tried to talk you out of going through with such an insane plan?”

 

Adam grits and looks away in shame.

 

“Blake did try to talk you out of this, right?” Ilia asks with worry clear on her face.

 

Adam still doesn’t look at Ilia and leans back instead.

 

“Adam, where’s Blake?” Ilia asks in a more worried tone.

 

“She’s no longer with the White Fang.” Adam says quietly.

 

Ilia stares at Adam, shocked at what he just said. “What do you mean ‘no longer with the White Fang’? Did you explode with anger when a mission went poorly and accidently kill her in the process?”

 

“NO!” Adam roars, standing up suddenly to face Ilia. “She left me in the middle of a mission and abandoned the cause without an explanation on why she did!”

 

“Then what did you do to make her leave?” Ilia asks. “Last time I saw you two, you were practically inseparable.”

 

“No, I…” Adam opens his mouth to refute that but Blake’s voice echoes through his head. _‘What about the crew members?’_ Ilia watches Adam visibly deflate and sink back into his seat with a regretful expression on his face. “I may have an idea why she left but that’s not important right now.”

 

“Adam, do you know where Blake is at?" Ilia quietly asks.

 

"Yeah... I do." Adam softly answers with a sigh.

 

“Does this job you said you had for me have anything to do with getting Blake back?”

 

“No.” Adam replies without hesitation, surprising Ilia. “The job is that I need you to steal whatever information my business associate, who created this opportunity, has and keep tabs on her.”

 

Ilia looks at Adam with concern when he mentions the business associate. “Does Sienna know about this plan and this… associate of yours?”

 

“Sort of and no.” Adam responds. “Sienna know little of the plan and nothing about my business associate.”

 

Ilia narrows her eyes at this. “Did you approach them or is it the other way around?”

 

“They approached me.”

 

Ilia groans at this. “Before or after Blake left?”

 

“Both.”

 

“Both?” Ilia asks with great concern, not believing what she just heard and Adam simply nods in response. “Do you have a photo of this business associate of yours I can see so I know who I am looking for?”

 

“I do.” Adam opens up the folder pulls out five phots of a femme fatale with long wavy black and gold eyes that look like they are on fire, an annoyed looking gray haired teen, a dark skinned teen with mint green hair, a tri colored woman with a mischievous grin on her face, and green eyed girl with black pigtails and similar mischievous grin.

 

“This is my business associate, Cinder Fall, and these are her underlings: Mercury Black, Emerald Sustrai, and Neopolitan.” Adam explains pointing to their respective photos.

 

“Are you planning on betraying Cinder?”

 

“Maybe, I don’t know yet.” Adam truthfully answers. “But I feel that the information she holds is very important for helping me make that decision when the time comes.”

 

“When do I start?”

 

“As soon as soon as you leave this place.”

 

“How will I contact you?”

 

“Send a cryptic text message with the where and when I should meet you.” Adam explains. “Cinder infected the CCTS Tower at Beacon Academy with a Trojan horse virus and now has access to any info transmitted across the local CCT network.”

 

“Also, this an off the books job to ensure that Cinder will have very chance of finding out but also means the rest of my cell doesn’t know you here working for me.” Adam further explains. “So if you can’t texting me isn’t possible, then break into the main White Fang hideout where I will be staying most of the time without being seen and approach when you’re sure I’m alone.”

 

“Anything else I should know?”

 

“Yeah. They are currently staying and attending Beacon Academy, pretending to be second year Haven Academy students. Also Blake is attending Beacon as an actual student and I’m very sure that she or her team does not know about Cinder.”

 

Ilia looks at Adam incredulously at the mention of Blake before recomposing herself. “What if Blake discovers me somehow and outs me to the rest of the academy or to the authorities?”

 

Adam ponders this possibility. “Earn her trust through whatever means you find necessary, even if that means telling her that I am here in Vale and that you work for me. I… I really need your help to help get my cell out this situation I put them in.”

 

Ilia sees the look of desperation on Adam’s face. “Adam, are you sure you want Blake to know you’re here? She might freak out and try to have you captured as quickly as possible.”

 

“I’m sure. I need to face her at some point.” Adam replies.

 

"Then I should get going." Ilia says, sliding out the booth.

 

Before she starts making her way to the entrance, Adam stops her. “Before you go, take the folder. It has the location of the main hideout where I will most likely be and the location of a safe house you can stay at without worrying about other members finding you.”

 

“Thanks Adam.” Ilia say grabs the folder.

 

“No. Thank you, Ilia. I think I needed that.” Adam says sincerely as Ilia slowly makes her to the door.

 

“Your welcome, Adam.” Ilia says as leaves, heading in the direction of the safe-house. As she begins walking, she is initially excited to see Blake again and to some extent, Little Rose. But the feeling turns to dread when she realizes that she doesn’t know how Blake or Little Rose will react to her current active involvement in the White Fang.

 

Once Ilia is out of sight, Adam cradles his head in his hands as he begins all of his decisions he made since Blake left. The more he rethinks his decisions, the more he realizes how blind he was to effect he was on those around. Soon, his mind wanders down memory lane to this time last summer when Cinder approached him the second time.

 

_Adam looks between the briefcase full of lien and the briefcase full of various dust crystals then at Cinder, unimpressed with her show of power or her death threat. “I thought I said the White Fang can’t be bought.”_

_Cinder chuckles at this. “You misunderstand me, Mr. Taurus, these briefcases aren’t here to buy the White Fang. They’re here to show you the resources my revolution has access to and these cases contain a very small portion of those resources.”_

_“If your revolution has access to such a vast amount of resources, then why do need the White Fang’s help?” Adam warily asks._

_“Yes we have a vast amount resources but sadly, we are few in number.” Cinder replies with regretful face._

_Adam relaxes his hold on Wilt’s grip but continues to warily stare at Cinder and her two followers who are still on their hands and knees. “Before I come to a decision about this plan of yours, what is it?”_

_“The plan is to destroy the Kingdom of Vale to show the world that our revolution isn’t something that can be so easily ignored any longer.” Cinder explains with a sinister smirk on her face._

_“Impossible, such thing can’t be done.” Adam retorts._

_“For my small revolution it is. But with the White Fang as well, it can be done.”_

_“What’s in it for the White Fang if I agree?” Adam asks_

_“The fear and respect the Faunus and the White Fang truly deserve along and access to those vast resources that also includes an information network that allows us to find anything we need or desire.” Cinder calmly replies._

_“Anything?” Adam repeats with interest._

_“Weapons, blackmail, traitors who ran away, etcetera.” Cinder casually answers._

_Adam ponders the information Cinder has given about her proposal and the longer he thinks about it, the more appealing the possibilities for the future sound especially those where he gets revenge on humanity for corrupting his Blake and find his runaway lover._

_“I accept.” Adam says with an evil grin, completely relaxing his stance and sheathing Wilt._

_“I’m glad that we came to an agreement, Mr. Taurus.” Cinder says. “Accept the dust and lien that we brought with us as a gift of our appreciation. Have good day, Mr. Taurus.”_

_Cinder her fingers, turning to leave with her two lackeys quickly following suit. Adam walks up to the briefcases and closes them before picking them up to bring them into the main tent._

 

When the memory stop, Adam stands up in a rage, lifting up the booth’s table in an effort to toss it about when his scroll suddenly chimes letting him know he received a text message. Setting the table back down, he sits down and checks his to find a text message from Yang containing info on where and when their showdown will be. He puts down the scroll with a frustrated huff as he directs his anger towards himself for allowing himself to be so easily manipulated when he realizes Cinder took advantage of Blake leaving and chose her words very carefully.

 

As the anger rises, so does doubt as Adam begins questioning his ability to lead others and his supposed love for Blake. Eventually after a few minutes of contemplation, an idea form in his when he glances at Yang’s text message. Instead of capturing Yang to get to Blake as a result of the showdown, Adam sees an opportunity to maybe clear his head, pass some sort of message along to Blake, or allow Yang to turn him to the authorities so that someone more level headed could take over his place as commander. He weakly grins at the idea and gets out of the booth to begin heading back to the main hideout.

 

Meanwhile in Ozpin’s office, Qrow and Winter stand in front of Ozpin as he sits behind his desk while they wait for General Ironwood to arrive. Ozpin watches a silent recording of security camera footage of Yang and Adam leaving the detention center with fascination.

 

“What are you watching there, Oz?”Qrow asks out of slight boredom.

 

“Just watching security footage of Team CRDL’s latest attempt of harassment to ensure that is all they did.” Ozpin lies, seeing no need to send Yang’s family into a panic yet as the footage shows Yang and Adam exchange scroll numbers then go their separate ways.

 

“Have you considered harsher yet inventive ways to punish them?” Winter asks.

 

“The thought has crossed my mind but their overall progress has considerably improved since the beginning of the year.” Ozpin replies just as General Ironwood steps off the elevator with scowl on his face. “Hello James.”

 

“General Ironwood, sir!” Winter salutes.

 

“Ironwood.” Qrow casually greets.

 

“Good, the two of you are here. I’ll get straight to the point.” Ironwood says as he walks past Qrow and Winter to stand next to the desk. “As you both know for the past year, the White Fang have been a thorn in the local authority’s side with long string of dust store robberies and the confirmed relationship with Roman Torchwick. Until now, they haven’t done anything major but thanks to the Breach, that has changed.”

 

“Forgive for interrupting sir. But exactly happened for the Breach to happen?” Winter asks. Ironwood takes a deep breath and quickly gives a detailed retelling of what happened at Mt. Glenn. When he is done, Qrow and Winter are equally parts impressed at what Team RWBY was able accomplish and worried that the White Fang were able to build and maintain a base underneath Mt. Glenn.

 

“If that doesn’t make a parent proud, I don’t know what will.” Qrow says with a proud smirk on his face.

 

“I concur, Mr. Branwen.” Winter says with a proud nod of her head.

 

“Now that we are caught to speed. The reason I called you two here is that I need you to work together and find any White Fang hideouts and outposts in Vale so that my forces can take it out. But since the Breach happened, the White Fang has been silent and we haven’t gained any intel either.”

 

“So we’re going in blind?” Winter asks.

 

“Yes.” Ironwood replies.

 

“Meh, had worse.” Qrow nonchalantly says as he turns toward the elevator and leaves, earning a scoff of disbelief from Winter.

 

”And yes, you two will begin immediately. So you are dismissed, Specialist Schnee.” Ironwood sighs. Winter quickly salutes and rushes after Qrow, barely making it to the elevator before its doors closes on her.

 

The two of them share a ride down to the ground while they briefly discuss which part of the city they are going to start in when they arrive at the ground floor. After Winter quickly leaves the elevator, Qrow opens flask to take a drink as he steps off the elevator but his Semblance trips him, causing him to fall onto a waiting Prof. Goodwitch.

 

“H-Hey, Glyn. Sorry about that.” Qrow apologizes after he quickly removes himself from between her breasts and winces when sees the contents of his flask all over her.

 

“It’s okay, Qrow. I still see you’re unlucky as ever.” Prof. Goodwitch says with a soft smile as she pulls out a handkerchief to clean herself off. As she does this, she scoops up a drop of liquid with the tip of her finger and tastes it. “I see that you switched to something less alcoholic.”

 

“Well the stuff I had before was getting expensive and my nieces have been trying to convince me to stay healthy for them.” Qrow replies, earning a slight chuckle from Prof. Goodwitch.

 

Prof. Goodwitch checks the time and sighs in disappointment. ”Well unfortunately, I need to go. So stay safe out there, Qrow” They nod at each other in goodbye then go their separate ways.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Announcement: It may or may not take me 2 or 3 weeks to write and post Chapter7 due what I have planned for it. So don’t freak out if you don’t see anything for a while.


	7. Turning point Part 1

The next day

 

Yang anxiously taps her foot as she sits hunched over the front row desk, waiting anxiously for last class of the day to end. The last class so happens to be Prof. Goodwitch’s combat class and currently the sparring match in progress is Coco and Velvet versus Team CRDL. So far the match has been mostly one sided in favor of Coco and Velvet with Team CRDL getting in a couple of good hits before Coco and Velvet took out Russel and Sky in a series of combo attacks in the first half of the match.

 

Yang watches with disinterest as Cardin trades blows with Coco as Velvet unleashes a tornado of slashes with a wireframe copy of Crescent Rose on Dove whose defenses crumble immediately. The buzzer goes off, signaling that Dove’s aura has dropped into the red and thus his defeat.

 

“Dove Bronzewing has been defeated.” Prof. Goodwitch announces as Dove exits the arena to head to the locker rooms.

 

Hearing this, Cardin purposely strikes the ground between him and Coco with his mace, launching himself backwards away from Coco with the resulting explosion at little cost to his aura. When he lands, he immediately gets into a defensive posture with his shield raised while Coco and Velvet regroup. From where Yang is sitting, she hear Cardin audibly grumbling to himself about how easily Coco and Velvet’s divide and conquer strategy worked so well for them.

 

Yang turns her gaze towards Coco and Velvet to find them whispering to each other while making hand gestures on what Yang assumes is a plan to quickly take out the hunkered down Cardin. When they separate, Coco heads towards the edge of the arena and leans against the wall while Velvet eyes Cardin with an appraising look as she transforms the wireframe Crescent Rose into its sniper rifle form. Velvet launches herself with a shot to the ground towards Cardin, twisting her body midair to drop kick him but Cardin sees this coming and blocks the kick with his shield. When this happens, Velvet once again launches herself into the rafters with the wireframe Crescent Rose using Cardin’s shield as a springboard.

 

Velvet launching off of his shield causes Cardin to drop his guard and stumble backwards a couple of steps while Velvet changes the wireframe Crescent Rose to Nora’s Magnhild. As Velvet begins falling back down, a confident smirk appears on her face as she twist her body to bring ready the wireframe hammer to strike as Cardin stares up at her in… awe? Velvet slams the wireframe hammer into a defenseless Cardin’s chest, driving him back first into the ground and the buzzer announces his defeat.

 

Most of the classroom erupts in cheers while Velvet backs away from the flattened Cardin as the rest of the Team CRDL runs up to their fallen leader. Prof. Goodwitch quiets down the class as Russel, Dove, and Sky carefully check over Cardin for any injuries.

 

“I think I saw an angel.” Cardin lazily groans out as he lays there in a daze, causing his teammates’ eyes to widen in shock and their worry becoming deep concern.

 

“Professor, we’re taking Cardin to the infirmary to get his head checked out.” Russel calls out after Team _RDL stare at Cardin for a couple of moments incredulously. Prof. Goodwitch looks over at Team _RDL as they stabilize Cardin’s head in a makeshift brace and nods her approval before turning her attention back to the class.

 

As Team _RDL gets Cardin out of the classroom, Prof. Goodwitch clears her throat “For the next match it will be Fox Alistair and Yatsuhashi Daichi versus…” Yang tunes out the rest of what Prof. Goodwitch is saying as she looks at the clock hoping the bell to ring but then she groans when she realizes that the sparring match between Coco/Velvet and Team CRDL was first one of the class.

 

Adam leans back in his office chair, rubbing his temples in frustration as he takes a break from trying to figure out a way out of the current situation but so far he hasn’t had any luck. Ever since his meeting with Ilia, his head has been a raging storm of anger towards himself, self-doubt, frustration, and regret. To distract himself from these thoughts, he gets up and walks over to the office’s window that overlooks the warehouse main floor.

 

Outside, he sees various members of different ranks going about their businesses despite the grim situation, which brings a small reassured smile to his face. But the sight also brings about a stray thought: Should I really be their leader after purposely leading them into this situation?

 

Sighing, he looks over at the clock hoping it is time to leave but he’s disappointed to find that he still has a few hours left before he needs to leave for the gym. He turns his attention towards his desk that is littered with messily marked drafts he has been working since the early morning and begins clearing it off to begin drawing up new plans that hopefully hit the same roadblocks as the previous ones.

 

The bell finally rings, signaling that Prof. Goodwitch’s class is over and Yang all but runs over to the exit trying to get to the dorm room as quickly as possible without looking too suspicious. As the rest of class leaves the room, Weiss rushes past Yang, heading in same direction as her as if she’s expecting something.

 

When Yang reaches the dorm room and enters, she finds Weiss sitting at her desk rubbing her temples while she angrily mutters to herself about something. Looking past Weiss, she sees the laptop that Weiss showed the team yesterday with a red flashing screen and the word FAILURE prominently displayed on it.

 

“Uh what happened, Weiss?” Yang asks, unsure if she wants to get any closer to Weiss.

 

“My simulations failed again.” Weiss replies.

 

“Do you know why?

 

“Yes but every time I run them, they fail for one reason or another no matter what I change, add, or tweak the various theoretical laws, random events, and theoretical market trends.”

 

Yang thinks this over for half a minute. “Have you tried cheating?”

 

“I have but the results were completely unrealistic each time I do that.”

 

“Then something must be wrong with the program you’re using or with the financial reports.”  


“That is entirely possible and I wouldn’t put it past my father to do such a thing.” Weiss sighs as she shuts down and closes the laptop.

 

Yang uses this opportunity to quickly grab her gym bag containing everything for the showdown and quickly goes to leave the room. “Well… I’m heading out to Vale to train.”

 

“So soon?”

 

“After watching all of those second years fight us first years, I want to get some sort of a head start on training for the tournament.” Yang lies. “Do you want to join me?”

 

Weiss scoffs at this. “We’ve done enough training, we need to do is get started on our studies so we don’t get blindsided by whatever the professors are going to throw at us for Finals Week.”

 

“Your loss then.” Yang says dismissively and wave of her hand as she heads through the doorway and rushes down the hallway while making sure that she texts Ruby to avoid worrying her again.

 

Meanwhile in Ozpin’s office, the headmaster leans back in his chair to take a small break from going through all of the various pieces of paperwork that cover his desk. He gets out his chair, grabbing his steaming coffee mug in the process and walks over to the window overlooking the academy’s courtyard. Taking a sip as he watches students go about their daily activities, he barely spots Yang rush out of the dorms towards the airship docks. Ozpin raises an eyebrow in interest at this before he turns away to retrieve his cane and leave a note for Glynda vaguely explaining his absence then he leaves his office to follow after Yang.

 

Adam crumples yet another draft of a plan in frustration when the predicted outcome resulted in Cinder and her unknown number of allies destroying him and his cell for successfully leaving the kingdom without prior notice. Grumbling in frustration, he looks up at the clock and is relieved to see that it was nearly time to leave. quickly destroying the draft so that Cinder’s lackeys don’t accidently discover it in their boredom, he stands up and walks out of the office, retrieving Blush & Wilt and a gym bag along the way.

 

As Adam makes his way towards the exit trying his best not get spotted, Andre spots him anyways and walks over to him with a folder in his hand. “Adam! All of our bases finally checked in with us and sent over their current status and their casualty reports.”

 

“How are they doing?” Adam asks, turning towards Andre.

 

“So far, all of our bases haven’t been found by the authorities and there have been a few run-ins with Humanity’s Shield members. Thankfully all of them ended with the H.S. members being arrested but most surprising of all, the police didn’t harass our members for being a Faunus, according to reports.” Andre explains. “Also the other the bases have confirmed your reports of Grimm being inside the city and has been mostly Creeps with the occasional Beowolf.”

 

Adam is slightly relieved upon hearing the news. “How bad are the casualties?”

 

“The other bases lost a few members each when the Breach happened and most the casualties the cell suffered as whole were from the Mt. Glenn base.” Andre says as he hands Adam the folder. “The folder contains all of the casualty reports including the on for Mt. Glenn.”

 

Adam flips through and quickly scans the list but he stops at the Mt. Glenn list, letting out a regretful when he sees the lieutenant’s name who was with him for both of the meetings with Cinder and was first person to voice their opinion against the acceptance of Cinder’s proposal. As Adam quickly looks over the list, Andre notices the gym bag Adam is carrying. “Uh Adam… are you going somewhere?”

 

“I’m meeting my contact again.” Adam lies.

 

“Okay but why a gym bag?” Andre asks, looking at the bag skeptically.

 

“The meeting is at a gym and I need to clear my head again.” Adam relies.

 

“Adam, are the plans you are coming up with hitting that big of a roadblock?”

 

“Yes.” Adam simply replies.

 

Andre sighs. “Then please be careful out there. We can’t afford to lose you.”

 

“I’ll try to.” Adam replies, nodding in agreement before continuing on towards the exit. ‘I’m sure that you’ll be a much better leader than I am.’

 

Sitting in an outdoor café, Ilia grumbles as she stares up at Beacon Academy and the cliffs that it sits on in frustration as she takes a break from search of finding a way to infiltrate Beacon that has been fruitless so far. She looks down at the list of crossed off infiltration methods and sighs knowing each method would have worked if the overall security in Vale wasn’t on high alert.

 

Deciding that her break is over, she gets up to leave the cafe when she catches a glimpse of a familiar red/black coat and red hair pass by her. Turning to get a better look, she sees a mask less Adam carrying a gym bag, walking away from her without acknowledging her presence. Finding this odd, Ilia begins following him through the city and eventually Adam comes to a stop in front of building called Gym Rockers and a woman with a long, untamed blonde hair approaches him. She quickly gets into a nearby hiding spot, ignoring the questioning look of white haired green suit wearing man who is sitting close to her.

 

From where Ilia is, she sees Adam and the blonde have a standoff as they exchange what Ilia assumes is greetings or quips at one another but she can’t tell from how far away she is from them. As Adam and the blonde enter the gym, Ilia decides not to follow them inside figuring that whatever reason Adam has for meeting the blonde isn't worth knowing since she has a job to worry about.

 

Inside of the gym after Adam and Yang changed into appropriate gym attire, Yang, with Ember Celica on her wrists, leads Adam, who has Blush & Wilt at his side, to the room she reserved and past full or clearly marked sparring rooms. When they arrive, Adam is confused when he sees the boxing ring in the middle of the room that looks like it hasn't seen much use in a long time, dusty mirrors that cover the entirety of wall opposite of the door, and a couple of metal chairs strewn about the room but he doesn't say anything. His confusion deepens when Yang digs through her gym bag and tosses a pair of MMA gloves.

 

"Ok Adam, this how we're going to do this: no weapons, just our bodies." Yang says, taking off Ember Celica and setting down them down on a nearby chair as show of what she said is true before putting on a pair of MMA gloves. Adam finds this reasonable and sets down Blush & Wilt against the wall and puts on the pair of gloves Yang tossed him as Yang climbs into the boxing ring. He climbs into the ring after Yang and they go to opposite corners to face each other.

 

They warily stare at each other and nervously inch their way towards the middle with their fists raised defensively, unsure who is going which one of them is going to strike first. When they get within a foot of each other, they nervously stand there looking for an opening while shifting their position ever so slightly.

 

Adam looks away for a split second when Yang feigns going one direction and she throws a right straight jab that Adam dodges followed by a left uppercut that grazes Adam’s cheek. Adam twists his body to deliver a right uppercut to Yang’s chest to force her back and give himself some space. They separate briefly before Yang charges Adam with her right arm ready to strike but Adam side steps to her left and thrusts his left knee into her stomach which sends her stumbling into the ropes.

 

Leaning against the ropes, Yang hears Adam rush towards and she quickly turns around, striking him in the face with her elbow. Adam staggers backwards a few steps and Yang closes the distance between the two of them, throwing a flurry of jabs that Adam can barely block or dodge some of them in time. Yang’s assault lasts a minute before Adam manages to grab one of Yang’s fists in midair then head-butt her followed by a straight jab that impacts her upper cheek. Yang gets herself free and they back away from each other to catch their breaths.

 

Yang studies Adam’s posture to see if she did any real damage but from what she can see is that she did very little. Taking a quick deep breath, Yang steels herself as she begins cautiously approaching Adam. At the same time, Adam catches his breath and eyes Yang trying to predict her next move. Deciding to go on the offensive, he readies his fists and charges towards Yang.

 

They once again meet in the middle of the ring with Adam ready come out swinging and Yang immediately raises her guard to block his punches. Adam throws out a flurry of hooks and uppercuts that Yang sees coming and easily blocks the flurry. But he follows up the flurry with roundhouse kick to her head that her raised guard barely holds against and sends her stumbling sideways a couple steps anyways.

 

Yang quickly recovers then gets close to Adam before he can fully recover from his kick and delivers a right hook that causes him to stumble backwards a step which allows Yang to regain her composure. She throws a couple jabs to keep him off balance and immediately follows up with an uppercut that forces Adam to the ropes. Leaning back against the ropes frustrated, Adam eyes Yang looking for an opening and doesn’t find any when he sees Yang doing her best to defend her torso but he doesn’t see her doing anything to protect her legs.

 

Getting off the ropes, Adam confidently approaches Yang with his guard up and a plan in mind. Yang throws out a couple of jabs to test Adam’s guard and throws a left hook but Adam blocks it easily then low kicks her knee to knock her to one knee. He immediately knees her in the face, sending her reeling backwards and he begins charging his semblance with the hope of ending the fight sooner rather than later. Once Yang gets her footing back, she sees Adam begin to glow and grins when she remembers Blake telling the team about how Adam’s semblance, so she waits for Adam to make his move.

 

Seconds later, Adam’s semblance is done charging the kinetic energy built up over the course of the fight and charges forward with his right fist ready to strike. But Yang sidesteps to the left like a matador and Adam instead strikes the corner post behind her as some of the kinetic energy transforms into rose petals that fly off of Adam’s body. This causes it to tear away from the ropes and the ring itself then fly through the wall behind it with a loud thud.

 

When Adam turns around to face Yang, he sees her eyes turn red and her hair light itself on fire making him assume that is a telltale sign of her semblance activating. He immediately puts up his guard with worry of what Yang’s semblance might be as she charges forward towards him. Yang launches a barrage of jabs that forces Adam to continuously block each punch and back up a step each time. When the first punch lands, Adam feels that the punch is much heavier than the punches beforehand, giving him an idea on what her semblance is which makes him worry. As the barrage continues Adam is eventually pushed back to the ropes and his guard begins to slip as he looks for an opening in Yang’s barrage.

 

Once again, Adam notices Yang’s legs wide open for an attack and in between the punches, he lowers guard long enough to take one punch while he kicks one of Yang’s legs in to throw her off balance. He immediately exploits the opening by unleashing his own flurry of jabs that forces Yang back, creating space between the two of them again.

 

Catching their breaths again, Yang finds herself frustrated with how the fight has turned into a stalemate making her angry but the memory of Blake softly smiling at Weiss and taking ahold of her hand reminds her of what she is fighting for. While Adam finds himself worried about how this fight is going but a memory of him and Blake arguing over something followed by him stopping himself from nearly hitting flashes through his mind, causing anger towards himself to bubble up and reminds him why he didn’t back out if this fight. Spurred on by their memories, both of them decide to go on the offensive and charge each other ready to trade blows. Because her curiosity got the best of her, Ilia watches in shock, horror, and odd fascination from just outside the slightly ajar door as Adam and this blond woman, who she is sure is not a Faunus, begin to trade blow for blow. Unbeknownst to her, Ozpin silently stands a ways behind her watching as well.

 

Adam and Yang strike each other at the same time with right hooks then strike each other again with a left hook, causing both of them to stumble backwards. They quickly recover and Yang delivers a straight jab that impacts Adam’s face followed by Adam quickly recovering and delivers a roundhouse kick to the left side of her abdomen. Reeling back from the kick, a brief memory of the Breach appears in Yang’s mind and she quickly recovers to barrage Adam with a barrage of hooks and uppercuts.

 

Adam manages to block some of the punches but a heavy right hook catches him in the in the left cheek. Staggering backwards a couple of steps from the hook, the memory of the Lieutenant and other members of his cell at the time voicing their well justified disapproval Cinder’s proposal followed by him easily convincing them why it would work flashes through his mind and the anger intensifies as Yang continues her barrage. He ducks and weaves to get close to Yang, ignoring the punches that graze him and throws a right hook into her chest which causes to stagger backwards a couple of steps. Adam follows up with a low kick to the back of Yang’s right knee then thrusts his right knee into her face as she falls forward. He begins charging his semblance as Yang reels backwards onto one of the three corner posts.

 

An image of a burning Vale at the height of the Vytal festival flashes through her mind and she steadies herself in time to notice Adam glowing as he charges towards her. Yang barely dodges in time, feeling air rush past her shoulder as Adam’s semblance fueled fist flies past her, striking the corner post. The post rips away from the ring and ropes before bouncing off the ground into the mirror, shattering a section of it. Yang and Adam quickly turn around to face each other and immediately strike each other with a right hook, sending Yang into the middle of the ring and Adam closer to the rope/post-less corner.

 

As they reel back, an image of Ruby, Weiss, Blake, her father, Qrow, Team JNPR, and Team CFVY smiling at her appears in Yang’s mind while an image of the little boy kneeling on the ground crying over his dead parent’s bodies while as a dead Grimm dissolves nearby appears in Adam’s mind. Adam clenches his right fist then quickly charges his semblance with what little kinetic energy he has left as Yang readies her fists in anticipation. They charge then strike each other in the left with semblance fueled right hooks, shattering their auras and knocking each other out at the same time.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Author’s Note: So this chapter and the next were supposed to be one. But I decided to split it into two chapters due to the difficulties I am having writing the next chapter.


	8. Turning Point Part 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Author’s Note: Hello everyone, sorry for taking a while with this chapter. It turned a lot longer than I envisioned and hopefully I don’t have to rewrite for a fourth time.

When Adam and the blonde fall to the ground in a heap with Adam’s aura-rose petals falling all around them, Ilia panics as she tries to decide what to do when she hears thud near her. Turning to the source of the noise, she sees a white haired man in green and black gym attire stumbling a little bit towards her with a pained look on his face. They catch each other’s stare for a moment and Ilia awkwardly walks away, trying to make it look like she was wasn’t spying on anyone. Ozpin raises an eyebrow as the freckled girl quickly walks away before he shrugs off what happened and enters the room where Adam and Yang lie unconscious. Nearby, Ilia sees the man enter and decides to pretend to work out on the nearby equipment in case something happens.

 

Upon entering the room, Ozpin sighs and makes a mental note to reimburse the gym when he sees the damage that has done to it. He quietly walks over to the ring to check on the unconscious pair and winces at the sight of the black eyes forming on Adam and Yang’s faces. He turns to walk out of the room when his scroll starts to ring loudly causing Adam and Yang to stir and he hastens his retreat to make sure he isn’t caught. Once outside of the room, he looks at his scroll to find that Glynda is calling and he hesitantly answers as he walks away. Ilia watches as the white haired man walks away towards the reception desk as he sheepishly talking on his scroll and decides to continue working out nearby in order to keep on things. Sure enough the white haired man comes back sits just outside of the room, making Ilia suspicious.

 

Meanwhile in the room, Adam and Yang slowly awaken and groan in pain as they roll onto their backs. Adam lays there slowly recovering from the daze of the knockout before he hisses in pain when his fingers brush against the skin around his left eye. At the same time, Yang tries to sits up but she immediately regrets her decision as waves of aches and pains roll over her body just before she winces at the sight of her developing black eye in the remains of the wall mirror.

 

Memories of the past few days slowly return to Adam, making him cringe at his own actions. Thinking back on those actions, he sighs regretfully knowing how easily he entered the downward spiral of his psyche which reinforces what Ilia said yesterday about him fucking up big time.

 

_‘Great job Yang on thinking that taking away his weapon would make him less of an experienced fighter.’_ Yang berates herself as she lays there letting her body rest and deciding her plan once again failed. She grumbles to herself as she tries figure out what she could have done for her plan to succeed. She continues to lay expecting White Fang members to come rushing in but after a minute, nothing happens. Despite her body’s protests, Yang sits ups and looks over at Adam to discover that he is just lying lost in his thoughts.

 

Suddenly Adam lets out a sigh and sits up, making her worry what is about happen next. When Adam uneasily stands up through gritted teeth, she assumes the worst and tries to stand up as well to defend herself but she immediately falls back down. She curses underneath her breath when she tries to stand again to ready herself for another round but once again she falls back down onto one knee. Suddenly movement just inside her field catches her attention and when she looks up, she sees Adam slowly walking towards with an unreadable look on his face.

 

“Comeback for more?” Yang defiantly asks.

 

"No I did not." Adam calmly replies as he extends a hand to help Yang up. "I'm here to say thanks."

 

Yang warily looks between Adam's hand and his face. "What for?"

 

"For being such a fool and challenging me. I..." Adam briefly thinks back to his state of mind for the past few days. "I really needed that."

 

"Couldn't you have just asked your comrades to spar with you instead?" Yang asks as she accepts Adam’s outstretched hand.

 

"Most of them know of my tendency of getting carried away and even fewer know of my semblance which makes them all unwilling to spar with to this extent." Adam replies as he pulls Yang up and catches her when she stumbles forward. "That being said, I must admit that you're quite good for someone who knows only one trick."

 

"Says the person with the world’s most useless semblance." Yang retorts as she carefully backs away from Adam to lean against one of the two remaining corner posts, unsure of what he'll do next. Adam heartily chuckles at what Yang said, knowing how true that statement is and Yang stares at him strangely, wondering if their mutual knock out broke him. “So what are you going to do? Kidnap me so you can use-“

 

“No!” Adam sharply says, cutting Yang off before she finish that asking that question.

 

“No?” Yang asks incredulously.

 

"It's not worth going through so much trouble to do something that would only make the situation my cell is in worse." Adam hastily replies.

 

"What about Blake?" Yang inquires, narrowing her eyes in the process. "I thought you were obsessed with her."

 

Adam tenses up for a second then sighs regretfully. "Once upon a time, I was. But knowing and seeing what that obsession has brought about, that is no longer the case."

 

Yang looks at Adam in disbelief of what she just heard and finds herself unsure how to proceed. "If that’s true and you actually did love Blake at one point, what happened to change that?"

 

"I didn't change, I relapsed." Adam replies, feeling strange on how easily he can recall the moment when his relationship with Blake took a turn for the worst.

 

"What do you mean 'relapsed'?" Yang asks, confused by his choice of words.

 

“I already had anger issues before I joined the White Fang and when I met Blake, I was immediately infatuated with her being along with being drawn into her belief of the White Fang’s goal at the time and found myself changing for her. So when she and got together as an actual couple rather than partners attracted to each other, I got over my hatred and buried the hatchet in a place where I couldn’t find it.”

 

Adam takes a deep breath, mentally preparing himself for the next part of his explanation. “But a few years later, I went on a solo mission that went south very quickly and I ended up killing a few humans because of what I saw happen during that mission, reigniting the hatred within without me realizing it. After that, Blake and I started getting into arguments every now and then and I subconsciously started seeing her as an object to keep me grounded as I started climbing the ranks.”

 

Yang thinks to how Blake explained her and Adam’s relationship and finds that Adam is confirming what she said. But considering what they both explained, she feels like something wasn’t said. “Adam did you ever hit Blake during these arguments?”

 

Adam freezes up at the question and stares at Yang wide eyed. “No I never did but there had been times shortly before she left that I nearly did and the closest I ever gotten was hitting the wall behind her.” Adam lets out a regretful sigh. “If she stayed any longer than she had, I would have most definitely hit her and I don’t think anyone would have stopped me at that point either.”

 

An awkward silence fills the room as both of them let what Adam explained sink in. Adam carefully climbs off out of the ring and sits down in one of the chairs, trying to quell the emotions that had risen up from his explanation while Yang sits down on the edge of the ring to gather up her thoughts. Suddenly, someone knocks on the door startling them out of their thoughts.

 

Adam and Yang at each other with suspicion but they quickly dismiss the thought when they realize they both came alone since nothing happened to them while and after they were unconscious. They both stand up at the same time but Yang quickly hobbles to the door, before Adam gets halfway to the door. Opening the door, Yang is surprised to find a female gym staff member with a small cooler in hand standing there.

 

“Hello Ms. Xiao Long, I’m here because a concerned customer…” the staff member trails when she sees Yang’s black eye.” Oh, oh my. Looks like the customer was right that you do need these.” She gives the cooler to Yang. “Is there anything you and your sparring partner need?”

 

“Uh… I don’t think so.” Yang hesitantly replies.

 

“Well if you do need something, flag down a staff member and tell them what you need. We’ll be sure to get to you in a timely manner for a small fee of course.” The staff member cheerfully explains, clapping her hands together before turning to leave.

 

Closing the door, Yang stands there for a couple of moments, unsure what just happened and opening the cooler reveals that it is full of icepacks. She looks at the icepacks then at Adam and decides to take a chance by throwing an icepack towards Adam as a sign of trust. “Catch.”

 

Adam easily catches the icepack but he immediately drops it into his lap, not expecting the object he caught to be cold. He realizes what it is and puts on to his black eye with a thank you. Yang closes the cooler and hobbles over to a chair next to Adam and sits down before pulling out an icepack to put on her own black eye with a quick hiss of pain followed by a sigh of relief. The two of them sit in silence as they enjoy the cool relief of the icepacks when Adam sets his down and turns to Yang.

 

“How is Blake doing at Beacon?” Adam asks with genuine concern.

 

‘She’s doing well.” Yang replies. “Though there were a couple moments where we thought we lost her.”

 

“Does she still care for the White Fang?”

 

“She still does despite learning and seeing Torchwick working with the White Fang when he was robbing the SDC shipment at the docks.” Yang says. “Seeing that broke her heart and sent her down a self-destructive path of fool hardily trying take down the White Fang all by herself.”

 

“Was she there when Torchwick fled in the Paladin?”

 

“Yeah she was there when he unveiled the Paladin at the White Fang meeting and helped stop the Paladin he was in.”

 

“Fucking Torchwick. You told me it was just some dumb pair of idealistic students who interrupted you both of those times.” Adam curses underneath his breath to himself after letting out an uneasy sigh. He glances over at Yang and notices the strange look she is giving him. He quickly recomposes himself with a cough. “And here I thought the worst trouble would sneaking in her pornographic books into class.”

 

“Don’t you mean her ‘Adult literature’?” Yang says automatically without thinking.

 

Adam stares at Yang incredulously before starting to chuckle that quickly turns into full blown laughter, earning a really confused look from Yang. “What? What did I say?”

 

“She’s still calling those books that?” Adam exclaims between gasps for air.

 

“What do you mean ‘still’?” Yang asks with curiosity.

 

Adam chuckles at this. “When Blake and I first met and before we started drifting apart as a couple, I accidently caught her in a compromising position and she quickly denied what the book was by saying it was ‘adult literature’ while hiding said book behind her back.”

 

Picturing a very flustered Blake trying her best to hide the book, causing Yang to laugh for a minute or two. “Sounds like there is a good story behind this. Do you mind telling it if you don’t kind?” she asks once she is calmed down enough to speak.

 

“Sure, I don’t mind.” Adam replies with a grin, figuring why not since it is the past and there is nothing incriminating in the memory. “Well it was a couple of weeks after Sienna rescued me from the back alleys of Mistral and she just convinced me to join the White Fang, we arrived at the camp that was set up outside of Mistral because there nowhere for us to stay due to the protests the White Fang were staging at the time…..”

 

_6 Years ago…_

_A 14 year old Adam wanders down the various pathways of the camp, inspecting it as he goes along. For the most part, he was generally impressed with way things were inside the makeshift looking camp and the camaraderie among the various members reminded him of home that he lost 6 years prior to coming here. Looking around once more, he spots a hill overlooking the camp with single on top of it and he decides that it would make the perfect to hangout until he has to meet up with Sienna again._

_Heading towards the hill, he soon arrives at the top and he immediately hears the various sounds of the camp float up to the top. Plopping down at the base of the trunk, he hears everything from a group laughing at something to something being cooked to someone turning a page of the book. He finds that last sound a bit odd but he ignores it and stretches out into a comfortable position when hears the sound of a book’s page turning again._

_Looking around, he sees no one until he looks up into the tree branches to find a girl nose deep in a book, sitting on what appears to be the thickest branch of the tree. Upon a closer look, he sees what looks like a pair triangular cat ears on top of her head that twitch ever so often, along with the fact that the girl has barely started the book judging by the small amount of turned pages that can be seen, and that the girl may have not noticed his presence._

_“Uh, hello up there.” Adam awkwardly asks._

_“Hello” the girl replies without looking away from her book._

_“I’m Adam. What’s your name?” Adam inquires, hoping to get more out of the girl._

_“Blake.” The girl replies in a monotone voice as she turns the page of her book._

_Adam find himself standing there awkwardly unsure what to do as Blake continues to read. “So uh… what are you reading?”_

_“A book.” Blake deadpans, earning an eye roll from Adam. He notices from where he stands the book’s front cover is obscured by Blake’s hand but the back cover is mostly exposed, allowing Adam to get a good view of the summary._

_“When a young Atlesian nobleman meets his soulmate in the city of Atlas, they enter a secret, forbidden relationship…” Adam begins to read off._

_Blake realizes what Adam is reading and hastily slams the book shut before attempting to hide said book. But doing so causes her to slip off the branch and fall. Luckily Adam is there to catch her but the impact of catching Blake forces Adam to fall onto his back. Blake quickly scrambles off of Adam when she realizes the position they are in and Adam sits up a moment later to find that Blake’s book somehow found its way underneath him._

_“Here you go, Blake.” Adam says, holding out her book._

_“Th- Thank you.” Blake says shyly, taking the book quickly with a flustered look on her face._

_“So what is this book you are reading?” Adam asks out curiosity now that he’s read part of the summary of the book._

_“It’s uh…” Blake trails off trying to find the best way the book without revealing the supposed forbidden nature of it while her face contorts in the process. “ADULT LITERATURE!” She squeaks out before backing away from Adam slowly when she sees the strange look he is giving her before she realizes that she accidently revealed the nature._

_Adam opens his mouth to say something but Blake suddenly runs off towards the camp, holding the book to her chest and leaving Adam standing there with his hanging open. Adam shakes himself out of his stupor and follows after the intriguing cat Faunus that he admittedly finds a little bit cute._

 

Despite the rather depressing beginning, Yang heartily at the last part of the story. “Did Blake get in trouble for reading that book?”

 

“Yeah she did. Her parents caught her trying to put the book back where she found it.” Adam replies, finishing the story with a soft, reminiscent smile on his face that sends Yang’s heart racing and causes her to slightly blush. Yang quickly covers up the blush by quickly looking away for a moment.

 

Another awkward silence falls over the room as both of them sit there with icepacks back on their black eyes. Yang leans back in her chair rethinking her plan while Adam hunches over replaying old memories.

 

_'Ugh, what am I going to do now?'_ Yang thinks. _'Can I really go through with my plan after all that has happened so far? But what if I do turn him in and a crazier leader takes his place?'_

 

Yang shudders then sighs at thought and glances over at Adam as he leans smiling softly at what Yang assumes is a good memory. _'Was he always this attractive when he's not an angry asshole?'_

 

She shakes her head briefly to shake the thought away. 'I'm this to protect Blake not to score a date to heal my broken heart. But how?'

 

She compares the Adam that Blake told her about and met earlier in the week to the current Adam. But when she does so, she can't help but notice the similarities to her father's episodes of rage after her, Ruby, and Qrow got him responding to the outside world. She then remembers the ways they calmed him down and helped him get him over the episodes, prompting an idea begins to form in her head.

 

_'What if I can protect Blake by helping Adam with his anger issues thus ensuring that he go after Blake anymore?'_ Yang asks herself as she replays what Adam explained about his relationship with Blake. _'But how do I start such a crazy plan?'_

 

Suddenly her date plan for wooing Blake flashes through her head and she remembers the basic plot of plot of Tiger in the Ballroom. She grins to herself as she easily adapts the plan into a starting point of this admittedly crazy stupid plan that would hopefully serve as the perfect icebreaker.

 

"Hey Adam." Yang says breaking the silence. "What would you do if you got to meet Blake again?"

 

"I would apologize to her and ask for forgiveness for causing our relationship to wilt." Adam replied without hesitation.

 

"And then what?"

 

"I..." Adam thinks about this for minute but comes up with a blank. "I don't know."

 

"Then how about I give you a chance to earn her trust so you can apologize and ask for forgiveness from her?"

 

Adam looks at Yang suspiciously. "Why?"

 

"Because I want to protect Blake from you." Yang confidently replies.

 

Adam looks at Yang dumbfounded and not exactly following her logic. “Can you explain a bit more?”

 

“If I can help you deal with your anger issues, then when you possibly meet Blake at a later point in time you could surprise her by how you changed back to the person she loved and thus you can begin earning her forgiveness.” Yang replies.

 

Adam raises an eyebrow at this. "What makes you think I can change so easily?"

 

"You already recognize that you have a problem and know what it is. Which is difficult to do when someone doesn’t confront you about it. Plus you already overcame this problem once when you were with Blake, what's stopping you from doing that again?"

 

“Do you even have the necessary experience for this flimsy plan of yours?” Adam challenges, standing up and setting down his ice pack in the process.

 

“My father used have similar if not worse anger issues among other things when I was a child and my uncle, little sister, and I helped him through those issues.“ Yang confidently replies, standing up as well to face Adam in response to his challenge. “So when I say if have firsthand experience with this sort of thing, I mean it.”

 

Adam recalls what Yang said in the holding cell and understands what she meant a little bit better. He then considers Yang’s proposal and its potential benefits/consequences for a minute. "Okay but what if I relapse again and I decide to attack Mistral instead Vale?"

 

"Then I'll be there to help stop you." Yang counters.

 

“You and what army?”

 

“Blake for starters, Mistral’s Wall Defense Forces, the Atlesian army, Haven Academy Students, plus any hunters who just so happen to be in the area at the time, and any Faunus willing to rise up to oppose the White Fang. Just to name a few.”

 

“Oh? What makes you think that the Faunus will rise up against the White Fang?”

 

“Considering all of the stuff the White Fang did for the Faunus as a whole and the fact that things haven’t changed much for the Faunus either since you guys started to using violence to gain fear and respect. The kindling is all there, someone or something just needs to be the spark to light it up.”

 

_‘Like Blake’s parents, Ghira and Kali.’_ Adam thinks to himself.

 

“Besides what are you going to do to accomplish this attack? Take over the White Fang and hope no one notices your anger fueled mental instability and decides to take advantage of you being blinded by your own anger for their own goals?” Yang continues on, unknowingly hitting a nerve. “Surely by now the rest of the White Fang knows about your failure to successfully attack Vale."

 

Adam wants to say something to the first part of Yang just said but the second part unfortunately reminds him of someone rather important along with something he and Andre has been putting off/forgotten to do over the past year. Despite how worrying the reminder is, he makes a mental note for later while maintaining a calm expression. “Are you sure you want to go through with this? Considering all of the fire you’re currently playing with.”

 

“Yes.” Yang confidently. “It’s either this, I turn you in to General Ironwood, or we walk away and try to return to our normal lives.”

 

“But?” Adam asks, sensing there’s more to this.

 

“But we both know that there’s no way the General is going to believe a first year huntress in training captured the head of the local White Fang cell all by herself. He’ll just think it is a trap or a ploy to break Torchwick out of prison. And walking away would only bring both of us more trouble when people start asking how we know each other once we meet again in battle.”

 

“If you go through with this plan, won’t you lose your family, friends, and everyone else when they find out about this?”

 

“That is a risk I am willing to take. What about you and your friends and comrades if you accept?” Yang replies after flinching at Adam’s question.

 

Adam looks like he is going to reply immediately but instead he simply sighs in response. “Fair enough. Let me think about this.”

 

“Take as much time as you need.” Yang says, nodding her approval. Adam sits down and begins considering Yang’s proposal in his head for a minute before going through his memories to see what good his anger did for him over the years.

 

At first he finds himself warming up to the proposal when he looks back at his past before the White Fang and what his anger did for then. Then he finds the proposal even more appealing when he reminisces about the time he and Blake spent together as a couple before his reignited anger warped his perception of the world around him and drove them apart. And when he thinks about what all that has happened since Blake left him standing there on the SDC cargo, a very appealing idea for what his cell needs to do to get out of the situation they are in forms in his head which helps him realize some of the benefits of this proposal. _‘Even if I don’t get a chance to meet with Blake, at least I can have a much clearer head for the days to come.’_

 

“I accept.” Adam announces, prompting Yang to breathe a sigh of relief. “So what did you have in mind?”

 

“I was thinking of us going to see the premier of Tiger in the Ballroom movie the day after tomorrow then dinner afterwards to discuss where we go from there.” Yang explains as Adam tries to remember where he knows the book from but he can’t quite recall where.

 

“A movie and dinner? Really?” Adam asks, pushing aside his thoughts.

 

“Well we have to start somewhere. Why not a movie where a Faunus and a human overcome racial barriers and become a couple followed by in a relaxed setting?” Yang nonchalantly replies. “Unless you’re afraid of being in a room full of very emotional women?”

 

“Of course not!” Adam huffs, raising an eyebrow at Yang’s second question. “So when and where are we going to meet up at?”

 

“The movie is at the Gruman’s Mistralan Theater and it starts at 4:30 PM.” Yang replies, smirking. But when she goes to take out her scroll to get the address for the theater, she remembers that it is in the women’s locker room and she sighs as a result. “I’ll text you more of the details once I get my scroll back from the locker room.”

 

Outside of the room, Ozpin is taken by surprise by what Yang proposed and Adam agreeing to it. He then smirks at the potential of this turn of events and takes what Yang just said as sign that it was time leave. He inconspicuously starts heading towards the men's locker to get changed. Ilia sees the white haired man leave his spot and uses the opportunity to get even closer to the door while remaining concealed.

 

"I guess this is where we go our separate ways." Adam awkwardly says, unsure how to say goodbye in this situation.

 

"Yeah, I guess so." Yang awkwardly replies.

 

Both of them toss their ice packs back into the cooler before Yang closes the lid and picks it up while Adam picks up their weapons. When they both leave the room, Ilia gets a good view of their black eyes and their uh… happy expressions? She scrambles to leave the gym with a hope of intercepting Adam before he returns to base. Adam and Yang walk towards the locker rooms in an awkward silence, both of them unsure what to talk about until they reach their destination.

 

“Well Adam, today didn’t really turn out the way I expected it to but I’m glad it did.” Yang says with a grin. “So I’m looking forward to our meetup and you not getting cold feet at the last minute.”

 

“So am I.” Adam replies with a matching grin. “I’ll see you then, Yang and I’ll let you know if anything comes up.”

 

They both go into their respective locker rooms and begin to change out of their gym clothes and into their normal outfits. As she is getting changed, Yang is thankful for the way things turning out the way they did and she grins to herself as she thinks of the possibilities of this plan of hers. As he is getting changed, Adam finds himself intrigued by what Yang has planned and grins when he thinks about the possibilities of the idea that formed in his head.

 

When they are done changing, they exit the locker rooms only to unexpectedly run into each other as they leave at the same time. This leads to them walking towards the entrance of the gym in an awkward silence. Reaching the entrance, they go their separate ways after quickly exchanging goodbyes for a second time after Yang returns the cooler of ice packs to the front desk.

 

Walking down an empty street, Adam comes across a concerned Ilia leaning against an alleyway wall with her arms crossed over her chest. "Ilia? What are you doing here?"

 

"I could ask you the same thing."

 

Adam sighs, knowing he's been found out. "How much did you see?"

 

"The last bit of your fight with blonde." Ilia replies. "Who is she?"

 

"She's..." Adam thinks for a moment on how best to put this. "...a friend I've come to respect."

 

"What?!" Ilia as reels back in shock. "Are you sure?"

 

"I am sure." Adam says with a smirk. "What are doing here, Ilia?"

 

"Taking a break from looking for a way to infiltrate Beacon. The Breach caused a lot of the normal ways of infiltrating to become unavailable due to the increased security." Ilia replies, looking away.

 

"Understandable."

 

"Is the mission still a go?" Ilia nervously asks.

 

"It is." Adam calmly states.

 

"Has anything changed?"

 

"I have an idea on what we need to do about our current situation but not how yet."

 

"What is it?"

 

"I believe it is time for the White Fang to ends its partnership with Cinder and her allies." Adam says with dangerous smile on his face that worries Ilia.

 

"Does the blonde have anything to do with this idea?"

 

"No." Adam simply states. "She is helping me with a personal issue of mine."

 

Ilia looks at him like he’s gone insane and wonders what exactly happened in that room to change the passionate, charismatic, and angry Adam that she always knew into what she sees before her. She wants to say something about it but the calm look on his face convinces her otherwise. Instead she suddenly remembers the flyer that was handed to her yesterday. “Oh, right!”

 

Adam watches as Ilia digs into one of her pockets with a raised eyebrow when she pulls out a folded piece of paper. “What’s this?”

 

“It’s a flyer for a group called the Citizens against the White Fang and Racism.” Ilia explains as she hands Adam the flyer.

 

Adam warily inspects the flyer. “Do you if this is a new hate group like Humanity’s Shield?”

 

“I don’t think so.” Ilia honestly replies. “A Faunus and a human were handing these out side by side and the feeling I got from them reminded me of stories of the White Fang before Sienna took over.”

 

“Huh.” Adam simply says, looking at the flyer with greater interest. “Thank you for showing this to me, Ilia. Is there anything else you want to show me or need?”

 

“No.” Ilia says, shaking her head no.

 

“Well, I should be going before my second in command gets too worried.” Adam says. “I’ll see you around.”

 

“You too, Adam. And please be careful, I can easily see things getting worse because of your association with that blonde.” Ilia says with worry clear in her voice.

 

“I will.” Adam replies, nodding to say goodbye before continuing on his way. Ilia nods goodbye in return with small grin on her face and begins heading back to her safe house.

 

Meanwhile in the main White Fang headquarters that is somewhere in the jungles of Mistral...

 

Sienna Khan watches the last bit of a Vale's News Network recording explaining what the Breach is and the events leading up to it. When the recording ends, she lets out an unhappy sigh and rubs her temples in an attempt to dispel the rising anger.

 

"Adam... what have you done?" She mutters to herself before turning her attention to a nearby subordinate. "Have we established contact with Vale cell yet?"

 

"No ma'am, we have not." The subordinate replies. "We are assuming that they maintaining radio silence until the dies down."

 

_'If it dies down.'_ Sienna thinks to herself. "What about Andre?"

 

"We still haven't heard anything from him yet." The subordinate hesitantly replies.

 

"Thank you and you are free to return to your duties." Sienna unhappily sighs.

 

"Thank you ma'am!" The subordinate salutes and leaves the room.

 

_'Andre, I sent you there to keep an eye on Adam and keep him from doing anything rash. But it seems you joined him in his plans.'_ Sienna thinks to herself when she is finally alone. She turns her attention back to the recording and glowers at the frozen image of Roman Torchwick being put into the back of a police cruiser. _'What are you going to do now, Adam?'_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Author’s Note: I would like to thank all of you who left kudos, subscribed, bookmarked, and commented. Hopefully you guys will enjoy for I have planned for the future of this story and I’ll see you next chapter.


	9. Chapter 9: The Settling Dust

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Author’s Note: Sorry everyone for taking a little over a month to get this out. I was writing this chapter at the same time I was writing the second chapter for my side project, Salem in the wonderful land of Remnant. I also went back to previous chapters and hopefully fixed most of the mistakes I missed, like the appalling amount of words my brain somehow skipped over when writing those chapters.

As Adam walks through the city, he comes an electronics store with several TVs in its front window, tuned in to a local news station. As he walks past, the current news story being discussed catches his eye and he stops to see what is being said exactly. Stopping to watch the news, he sees that there is a news story being discussed is about the authorities searching for the White Fang but are coming up empty handed.

 

Adam is relieved to hear the news but it’s immediately soured when the news anchors start discussing how police were tipped off and raided a supposed White Fang meeting which actually turned out to be a Citizens Against the White Fang and Racism meeting where a large number of Faunus attended with hopes of joining to do something about the situation in Vale and beyond. This segues into a discussion of how citizens are becoming dissatisfied with the results of the authorities’ current failing efforts to root out the White Fang and are joining groups like Humanity's Shield or to a lesser extent, Citizens Against the White Fang and Racism, as a means to do something against the White Fang.

 

Adam sighs unhappily and walks away just as another news story comes on stating the Vale Wall Defense Force confirms that a Beringels Grimm was spotted then killed just outside the Kingdom's walls the previous day. Resuming his journey back to base, he makes a mental list of tasks for his men to carry out to give the cell a little bit more breathing room. The journey back was mostly uneventful thanks to a small delay caused by a group of annoyed police closing off a block due to a sightings of a roaming group of Creeps in the area. Finally arriving at the base, Adam makes his way towards the command center with the intent of finding Andre while ignoring all of the surprised looks he’s getting along the way.

 

Quickly arriving at the command center, Adam spots Andre standing idly in the center of the room, reading over some paperwork. “Andre!”

 

Andre looks up from the paperwork and does a double take of what he sees. “What happened to you, Adam?!”

 

“Nothing important.”

 

“Nothing important? Adam, a black eye is not something you can brush off so easily.” Andre exclaims. “Seriously what happened? Did you get ambushed along the way to the meeting or did that contact of yours turn out to be a trap?”

 

“Neither.” Adam sighs. “The contact and I met at a local gym and they gave the information to me as we sparred.”

 

“And the black eye?”

 

“It turns out that we both needed to let off steam and we got carried away in doing so.” Adam replies with a straight face. He notices the question on Andre’s face as Andre looks at him with a concerned look. “Before you say anything, we knocked each other out at the same time.”

 

“Uh huh.” Andre simply says, dropping the subject. “So what was it that you needed?”

 

"I need to speak to you on some matters that will affect the future of our cell in private."

 

Andre raises an eyebrow in surprise. "Okay, lead the way, Adam."

 

Adam turns around to leave the command center with Andre and they begin heading towards Adam’s office. As they walk, Adam speaks up. “Has anything changed since I’ve been gone?”

 

“Nothing has changed much besides a report of a pair of hunters were seen snooping around the warehouse where Torchwick revealed the stolen Paladins’ existences to the world.” Andre replies.

 

Adam pauses very briefly at the news. “Do you know if they found anything?”

 

“No idea but I am very sure we scrubbed that place clean of everything that would lead other bases and personnel and made sure that we didn’t leave behind any supplies behind either after what happened there with those two hunters-in-training.” Andre replies as they begin climbing the stairs leading to Adam’s office.

 

“Worrisome.” Adam mutters to himself.

 

Andre is surprised when they walk past Adam's office and instead they are heading towards the roof access. Once they reach the roof, Adam looks all around to make sure no one else is in the general area and blocks off the door.

 

"Adam, what's going on?" Andre asks, concerned by Adam's actions.

 

"I have an idea on how to give us more breathing room in our current situation and I need to know if I can still count on you to remain loyal to me." Adam ominously replies once he's sure that they are alone.

 

"You know I will be always loyal to the White Fang." Andre says, worried of what this idea is.

 

"Good because I believe it is time for us to end our partnership with Cinder and whomever her allies are." Adam confidently announces.

 

“What!?” Andre shouts, doing a double take at the same time before quickly recovering from his shock. “Are you sure?”

 

“I am very sure.” Adam confidently replies. “Especially after all that has happened so far.”

 

“Torchwick is one thing. But Cinder?” Andre inquires.

 

“But it was Cinder who insisted that we work with him from the beginning.” Adam immediately replies.

 

“But still after all the support you shown for her and your acceptance of her things she’s given us like: the information on how to safely acquire the Paladins given to us by her contact inside the SDC owned Watts Industries, the resources she secured to hasten our initial setup, and so on.” Andre says.

 

"What changed, Adam?"

 

"Over the past few days, I had the chance to see what my decisions has done for us. That's what changed." Adam somberly replies. "And look what happened as a result. We’re surrounded on all sides by friend and foe alike, a good 1/7th of our entire cell dead, and a human supremacist group has risen up as a direct result of our actions!”

 

“Adam, you had no way of knowing the way things would turn out.”

 

“But I could have prevented all of this from happening.” Adam snaps. “I could’ve just pretended to accept Cinder’s deal and had the cell return to Mistral like we were supposed to.”

 

“My point still stands.”

 

“Andre, you weren’t there when she and her two lackeys fought the entire camp by themselves and won before she had the audacity to threaten me to accept her proposal.” Adam explains. “Hours after Blake escaped from the White Fang too!”

 

“Then why did you accept then?”

 

“I was not handling Blake’s departure very well and Cinder made her proposal very, very hard to pass up.” Adam replies. “It’s as if she knew Blake was going to leave.”

 

Andre opens then closes his mouth to try to say something but nothing comes out. Instead he leans against the railing, letting what Adam just revealed sink in. After a minute or two of contemplation, Andre speaks up after pushing off the railing. “Do you have a plan?”

 

“Not yet.” Adam replies. “But I already sent someone in to retrieve any piece of information Cinder has that can be used against her so we can begin formulating a plan.

 

“Is this person from our cell?”

 

“No.” Adam replies, shaking his head. “I am sure that Cinder would spot the infiltrator right away if they were from this cell.”

 

“Understandable.” Andre says in return. “What are we going to do while we wait for this infiltrator of yours to do their job?”

 

“Infiltrate Humanity’s Shield and Citizens Against the White Fang and Racism.”

 

Andre looks at with confusion clear on his face. “Why? H.S. is too disorganized to do anything and I never heard of C.A.W.F.R. until now.”

 

“Exactly. We know nothing about what C.A.W.F.R. is capable of and H.S. may be disorganized now but what about tomorrow or any time after that.” Adam points out. “They may become…”

 

“They may become what?” Andre asks a moment after watching Adam trail off and shudder.

 

“…the human equivalent of the White Fang.” Adam finishes.

 

Andre takes in the gravity of what was said and sighs in agreement. “Ok, I’ll see who is suitable enough for these infiltrations and put together support/extraction teams in case things go south.”

 

Adam nods in agreement before unblocking the door and they both leave to go about their duties. When suddenly Andre stops in the doorway and turns towards Adam with a concerned look on his face. "Adam, if we truly do commit to this idea, what are we going to do afterwards? There's no way we can return to how things were before Cinder."

 

 

Adam tenses up at the question and after a minute of consideration, he finds that he doesn't have answer. "I... I don't know. But I'm sure something will present itself when we get to that point... hopefully,"

 

Yang leans back in her seat on the airship back to Beacon Academy, contently humming. Various ideas flows through her head as she formulates an outline of a plan on how to help Adam with his anger. The pilot of the airship announces their imminent arrival and asks the passengers to buckle up for the landing.

 

As soon as the airship lands and the passengers are free to disembark, Yang begins making her towards the dorm room as she continues to hum with happy look on her face. Along the way, various students that she just happen to pass by, gives her very strange looks when they see Yang's black eye and the happy mood she is in. As soon as Yang is out of earshot, the students begin discussing what could have possibly happened to her and why.

 

Meanwhile in Team RWBY's dorm room, Ruby lays in her bed with a laptop on her lap while Weiss and Blake cuddle on Blake’s bed. Blake is reading a romance novel while Weiss studies old SDC financial reports. Currently, Ruby is absentmindedly looking through a local weapon shop’s online catalog for the materials and weapon parts needed for the construction of the Rose Thorn prototype. But her mind keeps wandering to thoughts of the cute, freckled girl who she dubs Ms. Freckles. She stops her perusal of a local weapon shop’s online catalog and sighs at thought of not getting a chance to get the girl’s name.

 

While she is lost in thought, Ruby doesn’t hear her scroll ding softly a couple of times, signaling that it received some text messages. Not realizing she received a text, she shakes her head of those depressing thoughts to focus on the fact that her father sent her the Indiana Jones tetralogy. These thoughts bring up the very recent memory of the long and awkward conversation she had with him about her dating someone while she trying to convince him that it wasn’t going to be a date.

 

Pushing away that memory, she grins at the knowledge of knowing that the DVD set is arriving tomorrow morning and she makes a note to remind herself to begin planning a movie night with Ms. Freckles and the rest of the team after she finishes her online shopping. Her scroll receives two more text messages when she resumes her browsing and refreshes the webpage just in case a sale suddenly pops up out of nowhere on items she already has in her online shopping cart.

 

“Ruby, aren’t you going to who is texting you and reply to them?” Weiss asks, annoyed by the phone’s dinging.

 

“Sorry about that, Weiss.” Ruby replies as she picks up her scroll to see who texted her. But as she does so, her scroll suddenly dinging like crazy as 5 text messages come in at the same time, causing her to drop it. She stares at her scroll like it’s possessed by Geist Grimm and cautiously picks up it to silence it.

 

“Uh… what was that?” Blake cautiously asks, peeking up from her book to look at Ruby.

 

“Uh… Nora texting me along with Jaune, Velvet, Sun, and Pyrrha about something involving…” Ruby replies as she notices the other text messages. “Yang?”

 

As if summoned by the mention of her name, a chipper Yang enters the dorm room with her black eye in clear view of everyone. Ruby, Blake, and Weiss suddenly stop whatever they doing to audibly gasp at the sight of the black eye, leaving Yang unsure to what she walked in on.

“Uh hey guys, what’s up?” Yang asks after closing the door behind her.

 

“What’s up? WHAT’S UP?!” Weiss exclaims while Ruby sends a quick reply to Nora once everyone recovers from their initial shock. “What’s up is your eye! What happened?”

 

“Once again, I got carried away with my training.” Yang coolly replies.

 

“Yang, punching bags don’t shatter auras and leave very noticeable bruises.” Blake deadpans.

 

Yang maintains a straight face as she panics slightly on the inside while trying to think up a good explanation without revealing her showdown with Adam. “Well while I was shadow boxing at the gym Dad and I used to go to, I met this hunter who was training alone because his buddy who was supposed to spar with him that day didn’t show up. So I offered to train with him, figuring that fighting a much more experienced fighter would be excellent training for the Vytal Tournament. He agrees and we get a little carried away with our sparring match.”

 

Ruby, Weiss and Blake all give Yang pointed looks for her explanation of what happened. After a moment of slightly tense silence, Ruby speaks up. “Yang, getting a little carried away should not result in the shattering of your aura.”

 

“To be fair, we both shattered our auras at the same time and we got a good laugh out it as well. Besides he had a cute smile too.” Yang says, trying to laugh it off but she honestly blushes at the last part, remembering Adam’s soft smile.

 

“Unbelievable.” Weiss mutters in disbelief, though she is slightly relieved to know that Yang is making steps to move on from liking Blake.

 

“Have you gone to the infirmary yet?” Ruby inquires.

 

“Why should I? It’s just a bruise.” Yang says, shrugging off what Ruby asked but the second round of pointed looks she receives from the rest of the team convinces her otherwise. “Fine, I’ll go. Just let put my stuff away first.”

 

Yang walks up tosses her gym bag onto her bunk which causes a book to fall in front of Weiss, who picks it up. Inspecting it as Yang begins searching for a blank notebook, Weiss is slightly surprised too that it is Tiger in the Ballroom by Ferdinand and Roja T. and judging it by its cover, it wasn’t Blake’s copy. "I didn't know you're reading this book, Yang."

 

Yang pauses her search to look up to see what Weiss is talking about. "Oh yeah. That book is a favorite of mine.”

 

“Since when?!” Weiss incredulously asks as she and Blake stare at Yang with surprised looks on their faces.

 

“A while ago.” Yang replies. “It’s a very good book and the only reason why you guys haven’t seen me reading it is because I didn’t want you to confuse me reading it as a means of winning Blake’s heart.”

 

Silence falls over the room as Ruby, Weiss and Blake accept Yang’s answer with a nod of their heads and find themselves out of things to talk about when Ruby speaks up. “Yang, You better get going before your injuries get any worse.”

 

“Yeah, yeah.” Yang dismissively says as she her search for a blank notebook and writing utensil. When Yang finds what she is looking for, she leaves the dorm room and quickly makes her way towards the infirmary as the rest of Team RWBY returns to what they doing.

 

As Yang make her towards the infirmary, she recalls the reason why she started reading Tiger in the Ballroom in the first place.

 

_12 years ago at the Xiao Long-Rose residence..._

_"... and they lived happily ever." Summer says to very drowsy Ruby, closing the storybook carefully. Summer giggles a little bit when she hears the 4 year old mumble something incoherently as she drifts off to with smile on her face. Summer leans over Ruby and kisses her on the forehead as she tucks her in. "Goodnight, Little Petal."_

_Summer sets down the storybook and stealthily exits the room only to make it a couple steps after carefully closing the door before being frightened half to death. "Mom, can you read me a story before bedtime?"_

_Quickly recovering from the scare, Summer turns to the source of the voice and finds her 6 year old step-daughter, Yang, in her pajamas standing behind with a hopeful look on her face. "S- Sure, sweetie. What do you want me to read?"_

_"A mature book." Yang confidently replies, catching Summer off guard._

_"Are you sure you don't want hear about how the princess saves the valiant knight from certain doom?" Summer nervously asks, hoping to steer Yang from the future of awkward answers to questions she will undoubtedly ask._

_Yang shakes her head no. "Those stories are for Ruby."_

_Summer narrows her eyes at this. "Are you tired of these types of stories I read to you and Ruby every night?"_

_Yang looks away for a second, squirming a little bit. "N- No. I'm Ruby’s older sister so if I can't handle a mature story th- then I'm not worthy of that title." Yang says, putting on a brave face._

_Summer chuckles at the sight but cringes when she tries think of an appropriate enough book in the house to read to Yang. She comes up with nothing until she remembers the book she bought recently but hasn't had a chance to start reading it yet. "Well how about this, Yang. There's a mature book I haven't started yet and if either you find don't interesting or like it, its bedtime and we'll find another one for next time?"_

_Yang ponders this for a moment. "What's the name of the story?"_

_"Tiger in the ballroom?" Summer replies, hoping she got the title correct._

_Yang's eyes light up with clear interest at the mention of the title, earning a brief chuckle from Summer. "Let me go find where I put it and we'll read it for an hour on the couch, ok?"_

_"Mhmm!" Yang hums excitedly, nodding her head yes. Summer heads towards her and Taiyang's bedroom to retrieve the book and to inform Tai of what is happening as Yang dashes towards the living room._

_5 minutes and a little bit of mental prep for the inevitable barrage of 'what does that mean' questions later, Summer sits down next an excited Yang on the couch. "Are you ready, Yang?"_

_"Yes!" Yang excitedly replies. Summer stretches out and opens the book to the title page as Yang snuggles up as closely as possible to get the best view of the book._

 

Yang's arrival at the infirmary door brings her out the memory and takes a deep breath to calm herself as the memory reminds her that a year later after that moment, Summer mysteriously died on an easy hunting mission. When Yang opens the door, she reels back a little bit in shock, not expecting to find the elderly female pink-haired, light-skinned professor sitting there. “Pro- Prof. Peach!?” What are you doing here?”

 

“Filling in for a nurse who called in sick.” Prof. Peach replies without looking up from her paperwork. “What can I do for you?”

 

“Well, I came here to get my black eye checked out.” Yang bluntly replies.

 

“Oh my, when did this happen?” Prof. Peach gasps before approaching Yang to examine her eye.

 

“A little over an hour ago.”

 

“What happened?” Prof. Peach inquires as carefully examines the eye which causes Yang to hiss in pain every now and then.

 

Yang quickly recounts the mostly false story she told the rest of her team while Prof. Peach finishes up her examination and moves back to the desk that she was sitting at.

 

“Mhmm.” Prof. Peach hums as Yang finishes recounting her tale. “Well considering the vague knowledge I have of how your semblance works, I am going to run some tests to make sure nothing else bad happened as well. If that is all right with you?”  


“Sounds good to me. Yang replies, moving further into the room.

 

Later that day, Yang lays on one of the infirmary's bed awaiting the results of various medical exams. She jots down thoughts and ideas into her notebook on how to proceed with dealing Adam's anger issues while Prof. Peach works on some paperwork at a desk close to the bed and while Cardin messes around on his scroll in sheer boredom. Suddenly, the door flies open, startling everyone and in walks a really roughed up Prof. Port whose clothes are covered in tears of various sizes.

 

"Oh my! Peter, what happened?" Prof. Peach exclaims, getting up to get a closer look.

 

"I was hunting a several packs of measly Beowolves when a small herd of Goliaths decided to join the fray." Prof. Port replies.

 

"Please have a seat so I can make sure those wounds aren't as serious as they look." Prof. Peach requests maneuvering Prof. Port to a bed in between Cardin and Yang. Cardin and Yang both give Prof. Peach a look of fear then they give each other a worried look.

 

"So what exactly happened for you to receive so many across your wondrous body?" Prof. Peach asks, not accepting the quick explanation from earlier as she begins examine with what looks like flirtatious movements. Cardin and Yang suddenly feel uncomfortable with the situation before bracing themselves for what's is to come when they see an all too familiar gleam in Prof. Port's eyes as he takes a deep breath.

 

"Well this morning I had nothing to do since all paperwork got done the previous night and I had no classes scheduled for the day, I decided to see if there were any worthwhile requests to take up. Sure enough, the first one I see is a request from a village just outside the wall, asking for help with several Beowulf packs that have been harassing the village lately." Prof. Port proudly begins. Cardin and Yang groan as they attempt to tune out the story, knowing it is going to be a long one.

 

At some point in the story, Prof. Peach finishes her initial examination and asks him to take off his jacket and shirt for further examination. Cardin and Yang roll over onto their sides, internally screaming when they get an unwanted eyeful of a Prof. Port's bare upper body.

 

Prof. Peach sees their plight and fixes her mistake by drawing the privacy curtain, sparing the two students the sight of Prof. Port's bare upper body. But thanks to the angle of light pouring in from the windows, Prof. Port’s and Prof. Peach’s shadows casted onto the privacy curtain make it look like something entirely different that could easily be taken out of context is happening instead.

 

The curtains do nothing to dampen the sound of Prof. Port telling his story but thankfully, Prof. Peach opens up the curtains after a couple minutes to reveal a fully clothed Prof. Port. This happens just as he gets to an action scene in his story and Prof. Peach sits there listening with bated breath. Cardin and Yang fall asleep part way though the action scene and eventually, Prof. Port wraps it up.

 

“With a mighty upwards swing of my axe, I decapitate the herd leader of the Goliaths and the village erupts into cheers at my success at defending the village!” Prof. Port triumphantly says.

 

Prof. Peach chuckles a little bit laying a hand on his knee in the process but then she realizes something. “Peter, didn’t you say all of this happened just outside the kingdom’s walls?”

 

“Indeed I did. The town was a couple miles away from the wall.” Prof. Port replies.

 

“Oh my. To think so many Grimm, Goliaths included, would be so close to the wall with the Vytal Festival starting so soon as well.” Prof. Peach ponders. “Does Ozpin know about this increase of Grimm along the kingdom’s walls?”

 

“Not yet.” Prof. Port replies, shaking his head no. “I went to him first, wanting to report what happened but he ordered to come here to get my wounds checked out.”

 

“Well considering what happened, all you got were minor scratches and bruises that are well on their way to healing without any issues.” Prof. Peach announces.

 

“That’s good to hear.” Prof. Port replies. “Well, I should head over to Ozpin’s office before it gets too dark outside.”

 

“Be safe.” Prof. Peach affectionately says.

 

“I will but with the school year ending soon, who knows what trouble I will get into.” Prof. Port says with mischievous grin and flirtatious wink before leaving the infirmary. Prof. Peach grins as well, shaking her head in amusement as she returns to her paperwork.

 

Meanwhile at Ilia’s safe house across town…

_"She's... a friend I've come to respect."_ Adam’s words replay once again in Ilia’s head as she finds herself laying on her bed in the safe house, looking up at the ceiling to contemplate all that she has learned so far again. She lets out an uneasy sigh as a wave of various emotions mixed together washes over her. She honestly doesn’t know how she feels about everything that she has learned so far from the situation Adam has gotten his cell and himself into to Adam’s change after his showdown with that blonde woman.

 

For the situation Adam created, she figures it was just a matter of time before someone in the White Fang would do something like attacking a kingdom. But she didn’t think it would be carried out by her best friend shortly after her other best friend broke up with him, coupled with the fact that said break up seemed to spark it. Ilia realizes that she has a chance to start a relationship with Blake but the thought of going through with that idea with all that has happened makes her feel like a scumbag taking advantage of her best friend’s sort of recent relationship status change.

 

Ilia sighs once again as another wave of various emotions mixed together washes over her at the thought of knowing that the relationship between Adam and Blake looked almost perfect from the time she spent with them then to learn that they broke up with Blake literally leaving the White Fang itself after she was reassigned to another Mistralan camp. This makes her wonder what could happened to Adam to lead up to the fight with the blonde and to seemingly change so suddenly afterwards.

 

In an attempt to move past these thoughts, her mind slowly drift over to those of Little Rose and how she leapt to her defense against that Humanity’s Shield member without hesitation. She blushes while her heart flutters at the memory and the feelings intensify when she remembers Little Rose finding her Faunus abilities cool which makes her feel special.

 

_‘Maybe after I gathered all of the information Cinder has, I can hopefully catch up with Blake without incident and maybe find out more about Little Rose.’_ Grinning at the thought, Ilia suddenly finds inspiration to keep searching for a way to infiltrate Beacon Academy. She pulls out the list ways of infiltrating Beacon Academy that she already ready started and starts going over them again to see if she missed something the first time.

 

A half an hour later, she sits in front of her computer drumming her fingers against the desk as she stares at the search engine webpage’s blank search bar, frustrated at being unsure what to type in. so far everything that she has come up with, short of walking in through the front door, has once again failed before they got off the drawing board due to the current situation Adam put Vale in and to the location of Beacon Academy.

 

She suddenly stops drumming her fingers and goes back over her previous line of thought. She tilts her head as she strokes her chin as she contemplates how walking through the front door might work. _‘If I just take an airship and just head towards wherever Cinder and her team are staying, wouldn’t that be too suspicious looking? Unless…’_

 

Ilia types the webpage she has in mind and hits enter, bringing up the website for Beacon Academy. She quickly scans and clicks through the page looking for the piece of information for this idea to work. When she does find the information she wanted, a confident smile appears on her face as she quickly copies it down on to a piece of paper and gets up to start packing the things she is going to need into an inconspicuous bag.


	10. Moving Forward

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: Hey everybody, FalseRobot here to nervously tell you that I managed to beat my Job/Personal life induced writer’s block and is trying to get back into the swing of things. So unfortunately, I can’t make any promises that this won’t happen again. 
> 
> That being said, please let me know how this chapter turned out.

**Chapter 10: Moving Forward**

 

 

The next day...

 

Ilia nervously shifts in her seat, trying not to look suspicious as the airship she is on flies towards Beacon Academy. She once again checks the duffel bag and makes sure that all of the equipment she needs for the infiltration and the exfiltration is all in there and undamaged. Satisfied that everything is still and undamaged, she takes a deep breath to calm herself down then looks out the window to find that the airship is on its final approach to Beacon.

 

When the airship safely lands and allows its passengers to disembark, Ilia blends in with crowd as everyone makes their way away from the docks. Along the way towards the Administration building, Ilia finds an inconspicuous hiding spot and stashes the duffel bag there before rejoining the crowd. She finds herself walking with what appears to be a small group of eager parents and their very excited children. Entering the Administration building, Ilia immediately spots her destination that is clearly marked by a large sign that says: Beacon Academy Tours and heads towards it.

 

Somehow, Ilia makes it to the sign in desk before the rest of the group, getting the attention of the staff member manning the desk.

 

"Hello ma'am, are you here for a tour of Beacon Academy?" The staff member greets with a cheery smile.

 

"Yes I am." Ilia replies.

 

"Excellent. Just so you know the tour is 10 Lien." Ilia nods in response and hands the staff member the money required. "May have your name so I can get you signed in?"

 

"Rain Bowstein." Ilia replies, coming up with the first thing that popped into her head.

 

"Thank you Ms. Bowstein." The staff member as they hand Ilia a visitor’s badge. "The tour will begin soon and your tour guide will be Dr. Oobleck instead of Prof. Port due to work related matters. So if you will please wait in the waiting area until he arrives and not wander off. That would be lovely." The staff member says with a smile, pointing to a clearly marked lounge.

 

Ilia nods and heads over to the lounge and sits down in one of the chairs as the rest of group begins to slowly sign in as well. She sits there anxiously trying her best not to attract attention to herself as the rest of the group fills in the waiting area. A few minutes later, Ilia finds herself even more anxious as she starts to run out of lies to tell in order to deflect the small talk made by the other teens in the group and a couple of the parents as they all wait for Dr. Oobleck to arrive. Suddenly, a sloppily dressed, green haired man holding a large thermos, suddenly rushes into the office followed by a slightly out of breath group of people that Ilia assumes is the previous tour group.

 

"Ah, welcome back Dr. Oobleck." The staff member greets. "Did the tour go well?"

 

"Indeed it did." Dr. Oobleck excitedly replies.

 

“Well the last tour group of the day has arrived.” The staff member says, directing Dr. Oobleck’s attention to Ilia and the rest of the group who waiting for the next tour as the previous tour begins signing out to leave.

 

”Excellent!” Dr. Oobleck excitedly says after looking saddened by the fact that this is the last tour group. He fast walks into the waiting area and claps his hands together to get everyone’s attention. “Hello future hunters and huntresses, I am Doctor Bartholomew Oobleck the history professor here at Beacon Academy and I’ll be your tour guide! Before we begin, there are maps of the campus for everyone to take so that no one will get lost and know where you are in case you do get lost." Dr. Oobleck gestures to an unassuming stack of folder paper on a nearby table that the group snatches up before Ilia has a chance to do the same. "Are there any questions and/or concerns you want to address before we begin?"

 

The group erupts into cacophony of generic questions while Ilia remains silent and somehow Dr. Oobleck answers all of the questions in order very rapidly. Once group exhausts their questions, Dr. Oobleck leads everyone out into the courtyard and Ilia is stunned by how beautiful Beacon Academy looks up close now that Ilia has a chance to get a good look. As she is admiring her surroundings, Ilia inadvertently tunes out whatever Dr. Oobleck is saying, missing the fact that he is speaking very rapidly and is nearly incoherent.

 

After a minute of gawking at her surroundings, Ilia turns her attention her attention back to Dr. Oobleck but she finds that she is standing there in the middle of the courtyard alone. Looking around wildly, she catches sight Dr. Oobleck moving quite rapidly towards one of the buildings followed by the rest of the tour group who are struggling slightly to keep up with him. Ilia panics slightly and begins jogging to catch up.

 

“Watch out!” A familiar voice calls out causing Ilia stop in her tracks after a couple seconds of jogging. Ilia turn towards the voice in time to see a trolley stacked with boxes of various sizes come flying right into her, knocking her over and out.

 

“…eckles! Are you ok?” The familiar voice worriedly asks, waking Ilia up slightly. Ilia groans as she slowly opens her eyes find a blurry red and black figure kneeling down next her while fretting over her at the same time.

 

“Little Rose?” Ilia asks, blinking a couple times to refocus her vision and discovers that she is lying on her back in the courtyard.

 

Little Rose gasps happily at the sight of Ilia being awake. “Ms. Freckles, you’re okay! I thought for sure I accidently killed you when I ran into you at full speed.”

 

“Well it’ll take more than that to kill me.” Ilia confidently says, sitting to see multiple boxes of various sizes scattered around her. “What happened?”

 

“Well you see, I was returning from picking up some weapon parts I had ordered for a project of mine and was to get started on it. So as soon as I got off the airship, I ran full speed using my semblance and uh… wasn’t paying any attention to what was in front until I saw you in the corner of my eye at the last minute.” Little Rose sheepishly explains with a blush on her face, idly twirling the hem of her hooded cape around her index finger.

 

“And once again, we literally run into each other. Are all of our encounters going to start like this, Little Rose?” Ilia asks with chuckle and a smile, causing Little Rose to blush even more.

 

"H- Hopefully not. I would like to know more about you before I accidentally put you in the hospital." Little Rose nervously says before taking a deep breath, standing up, and stretching her hand towards Ilia. "My name's Ruby Rose. What's yours?"

 

"Ilia Amitola." Ilia replies, accepting Ruby's hand to be helped up to her feet.

 

"So Ilia, what brings you to Beacon Academy?" Ruby inquires.

 

"I was part of the tour of the campus but..." Ilia looks away in embarrassment. "I wasn't paying attention and got left behind."

 

"The tour with Prof. Port right?" Ruby asks for clarification. "We can easily catch up with him."

 

"It's actually Dr. Oobleck guiding the tour." Ilia corrects.

 

"O-oh my. I'm not sure if that is better or worse." Ruby says, trying to wrap her head around that conundrum.

 

Ilia finds Ruby's thinking face incredibly adorable and tries her hardest not to stare. "Why do you say that?"

 

"Well, Port really, really loves telling stories but unfortunately the way he tells them makes them so incredibly boring." Ruby explains, shuddering at the memories of Salk the times throughout the year Weiss had to wake her up in the middle of his classes. "While Oobleck talks really fast. Possibly due to him drinking so much from that seemingly bottomless thermos of his." Ruby remembers the calculations she did to how much the thermos could actually carry only to be more confused she witnessed the thermos transform into the doctor's weapon.

 

"I see what you mean." Ilia simply says in response before sighing. "Probably by now, Dr. Oobleck is nearing the first stop of his tour."

 

"Then how about I give you a tour campus instead and maybe we can catch up with Dr. Oobleck and his tour at the end?" Ruby suggests.

 

"I would love that." Ilia replies. "But first, let’s pick up your boxes before someone else trips over them and before we forget about them."

 

"Oh yeah." Ruby says, remembering the reason why she left then returned to Beacon in the first place.

 

They begin their task with Ilia finding out that the boxes are heavier than they look and Ruby thanking herself for getting a trolley to transport the boxes. But after a couple minutes and more than few instances of accidental hand holding when they go to pick up the same box later, Ilia and Ruby stack the last of the boxes back into the trolley with barely visible blushes on their faces.

 

"So where to first?" Ilia asks, dusting off her hands.

 

"Uh... do you know which way did Dr. Oobleck went with his tour?" Ruby in return.

 

"That way." Ilia says, pointing in the direction Dr. Oobleck went.

 

Oh perfect!" Ruby exclaims. "Those are dorms which means I can drop off my stuff and then I can really show you the campus! Now if you will follow me please."

 

"So Ruby, are you a student here?" Ilia asks for a bit of clarification as Ruby begins pushing the trolley towards the dorms and Ilia walks alongside her.

 

"Yes I am!" Ruby proudly says, surprising Ilia a little bit.

 

If you don't mind me asking, how old are you?" Ilia inquires.

 

"16!" Ruby proudly replies.

 

"Wait I thought the minimum age to get in was 17?" Ilia exclaims.

 

"Well before the school year started, I stopped a dust store robbery which got me into a little bit of trouble but Prof. Ozpin, the headmaster, saw something in me and asked me I wanted to attend Beacon 2 years early. Of course I said yes and the rest is history." Ruby says after taking a deep breath.

 

"A dust store robbery?" Ilia inquires with curiosity. "Do tell."

 

“Well you see, I was minding my own business perusing the magazine stand…” Ruby begins as they walk towards the dorms, Ruby tells Ilia of her first encounter with Roman Torchwick with exaggerated sound effects and dramatic poses. Ilia listens to Ruby’s story intently while helping push the trolley when Ruby mimes poses that require her to take hands off the trolley.

 

They reach entrance to the dorms as Ruby finishes her story with a proud pose. "And that's how I am able to attend Beacon Academy and become the leader of Team RWBY."

 

"Wow.” Ilia simply says, blinking a couples times in surprise and stares incredulously at Ruby. “If I didn’t know any better, I would say that you’re lying. But after hearing that, you’re even more amazing.”

 

"Thank you." Ruby says, blushing in embarrassment while chuckling slightly before composing herself and gesturing towards their destination. "W- Well here we are at our first stop of the tour: The Dorms. A home away from home for all of the teams to rest their heads after classes and missions along with being one of the many places for hanging out with their friends!”

 

“Do the dorm rooms live up to Beacon’s reputation?”

 

“Possibly.” Ruby replies after thinking about this for a moment as she opens the door. “I’ll let you decide that when we get inside and get to my team’s dorm room.”

 

“Reasonable.” Ilia says in response, pushing the trolley inside. ‘I wonder if Adam knows about this failure of Torchwick.’

 

Once inside, Ruby takes the control of the trolley and the lead again while Ilia once again walks alongside her. They slowly make their way through the halls due to trolley’s lack of maneuverability while Ruby does her best to explain the general life in the dorms. But soon, Ruby finds out things to explain and silence falls over them.

 

“So…” Ruby nervously begins to say, breaking the silence. “What about you? Do you have any interesting stories to tell?”

 

Ilia looks away guiltily. “Not really. I’ve been doing various odd jobs in Mistral to get by and most of the time, I was alone.”

 

“Oh.” Ruby replies, disheartened by that fact. “What about coworkers?”

 

“Well…” Ilia thinks back to all of the White Fang members she has worked with back in Mistral and cringes. “…nearly all of them aren’t the best of company to hang out with.”

 

“Aw that sucks.” Ruby says in disappointment.

 

“Yeah I know. Plus, I’m sure any story I would have to tell couldn’t match how you got into Beacon Academy unless how the story of how you became team leader is somehow crazier.” Ilia says and Ruby looks away with a guilty look her face as they reach the stairs. Ilia looks at Ruby for a couple moments with a dumbfounded look on her face. “How do you top stopping a robbery all by yourself then get asked to attend a huntsman academy for very, very vague reasons?!”

 

“Well I’ll tell you once we get this up to the floor where my team’s dorm room is at.” Ruby says, first gesturing to the trolley then to the stairs.

 

Ilia looks at the stairs then at the trolley as Ruby says, “It should be an easy climb.”

 

Ilia take Ruby’s word and they begin pick up as many boxes as they can carry and begin climbing the stairs to the second floor. A couple surprisingly easy trips later, Ilia and Ruby take a small break after getting all of the boxes plus the trolley onto the second floor and let added back onto the trolley.

 

“Now where was I?” Ruby asks herself.

 

“You were about tell the tale of how you became team leader which somehow is crazier than how you got into Beacon.”

 

“Ah yes.” Ruby says, thinking off a good place to start. “Let’s see... after arriving Beacon for the first time at the start of the year and going through orientation, we, the new students, were told to report to cliffs overlooking the Emerald Forest for Initiation after retrieving our combat gear from the locker room.”

 

Ruby tells the tale of what happened during initiation as Ilia listens in disbelief at the fact that the headmaster just launched a group of teens off a cliff into a Grimm filled forest without any prior safety precautions. When Ruby explains how she hitched a ride on the back of a fully grown Nevermore Grimm after meeting Weiss, Ilia becomes even more skeptical.

 

Ruby pauses her story when they reach a kitchen/living room. “This room is the common room for this floor which allows student to cook, store, and eat food at any time when there aren’t any classes even though there is a cafeteria on campus.” Ruby explains. “But the cafeteria is only open at certain times of the day for so long.”

 

“Uh huh.” Ilia says in return before noticing an odd sign on wall near the entranceway they are standing next to. Looking closer at the sign, she discover that it is a notice signed by Prof. Ozpin stating that all actual games of Compost King are to be played outdoors unless the board and game pieces are used in a different manner.

 

“Is there anything you want in particular about the common room” Ruby asks, drawing Ilia’s attention away from the peculiar notice.

 

“Can you cook anything you want?” Ilia asks of the top of her head.

 

“Yes, you as long as you provide your own ingredients and clean up after yourself.” Ruby replies. “Also alcohol is very strictly forbidden on the school grounds for very obvious reasons since this is huntsman academy after all.”

 

“Understandable.” Ilia says with a shrug.

 

“Continuing on!” Ruby excitedly says, resuming their journey to her dorm and her story.

 

Ruby begins again by starting at the part where she jumps off the nevermore and skydives into the ruins where the relics were being held. Ilia is slightly surprised when Ruby gives a quick description of Blake wearing a bow in the top of her head but says nothing about it as Ruby gives vague descriptions of everyone in the story. Then Ilia has a hard time believing Ruby’s story when she tells how her friends, Nora and Ren, came riding in on top of a fully grown Ursa.

 

“Really? An Ursa?” Ilia asks, pausing for a couple of moments to give Ruby an unbelieving look.

 

“Well you have to meet her in person to understand the insanity that is Nora Valkyrie.” Ruby simply says in response.

 

“Uh huh.” Ilia replies.

 

Ruby shrugs and resumes her story by telling that once she and her friends united and got their relics, they were attacked by an aggravated fully grown Deathstalker Grimm and the Nevermore that she and Weiss hitched a ride on earlier in the story. This segues into them splitting up into two teams of four then taking on the Grimm at the same time. They arrive at Ruby’s dorm room just after Ruby tells Ilia of the plan she came up with to defeat the Nevermore that apparently involves her sister, Yang, being a distraction along with a makeshift launcher that is a combination of the ribbon attached to Gambol Shroud and Weiss’ semblance of glyphs.

 

“...and then I was launched towards the cliff face, clothes lining the Nevermore midflight. Thanks to my semblance of speed and the assistance of Weiss’s glyphs, I ran straight up the cliff while dragging the Nevermore by its neck and decapitated it when I reached the top!!!” Ruby exclaims as she strikes a proud victory pose. “And that is how I, Ruby Rose, along with Weiss Schnee, Blake Belladonna, and my big sis Yang Xiao Long got selected to become Team RWBY with me as the team leader!”

 

“If I didn’t know any better, I would say that you are simply too good to true.” Ilia says after giving a Ruby curious look for a minute or two. “Should I be worried about competition scrambling to earn your affection?”

 

“No.” Ruby squeaks, blushing profusely at what Ilia ask and nervously shifts on one foot. “What about you?”

 

“N-not really.” Ilia stutters, blushing profusely as well.

 

The two of them awkwardly stand for couple of moments before Ruby tries to compose herself and opens the dorm room door. “Well here is a... not so great example of the academy’s dorm rooms *cough*.”

 

They walk inside and the first thing Ilia sees in the spacious, homey dorm room is a messily made queen sized bed hanging precariously in the air above a neatly made bed by some rope that is attached to the ceiling, which frightens her. Tearing her gaze away from the sight, she looks to the other side of the room hoping to sees actual bunk beds but instead she sees two queen size beds stacked on top of each other with books being used as the support pillars.

 

“There is no way Blake would willingly let the loves of her life be used in such manner.” Ilia says out loud, without thinking as Ruby parks the trolley next to the neatly made bed.

 

“You know Blake?!” Ruby exclaims, turning towards Ilia.

 

Ilia realizes what happened and quickly comes up with something. “Blake is an old friend whom I haven’t seen in a couple years. But we parted on some bad terms.”

 

Ruby face lights up with excitement at first but quickly Morphs into one of disappointment, which makes Ilia feel guilty. “What happened?”

 

“We were having differences in opinions just before she had to move away somewhere else.”

 

“Oh.”

 

“So... about the tour?” Ilia asks, trying to change the subject.

 

R-right.” Ruby stutters. “As you can see, the rooms provided are spacious but with four people living in it, it can get a little cramped. Luckily students are in charge of room maintenance which gives us some freedom in personalizing the room like what I and my team has done.”

 

“Have you had any problems with the beds?”

 

“Surprisingly no. Though don’t ask Blake for the book she just put back. Her murderous glare is very scary.” Ruby replies, shuddering at the memory of the time when she asked Blake if she could read The Man with Two Souls just after she swapped it out for The Man with Four Souls. “A-anyway, as long as you don’t cause any major damage to the room, the staff won’t care how the room is personalized to a degree.”

 

“Understandable.” Ilia says without taking her eyes off of the bunks. “But are sure there haven’t been accidents regarding the beds?”

 

“The bed hanging from the ceiling, which is mine, is perfectly secure according to my calculations and the other bunks are …” Ruby confidently says but falters a bit when she looks at the pillars made of books. “Err… fine since Blake thankfully sleeps on the bottom bunk.”

 

Ilia pictures a tall buxom blonde girl that sort of looks like Ruby in pajamas haphazardly sprawled out across her bunk, kicking out her legs in her sleep and agrees with Ruby. Ilia suddenly compares Yang to the blonde woman Adam fought against but brushes it off, thinking that of it as mere coincidence.

 

Finding that she can’t think of anything else significant about the dorms, Ruby decides that it is time to continue on with the tour with a clap of her hands. “So moving on, our next stop of the tour are the classrooms.”

 

Ruby grabs one of Ilia’s hands and leaves the dorm room with a momentarily dazed Ilia following closely behind. Ilia comes out of her daze and picks up her pace in order to walk side by side with Ruby. As Ilia doing this, she doesn’t let go of Ruby’s hand and a pair of small smiles appears on their faces as the reach the stairwell.

 

“Are you sure you don’t have funny random stories from your odd jobs?” Ruby asks, speaking up to break the ever present silence.

 

Ilia makes a variety of faces trying think of a story among the many that would most likely get laugh. But all of those stories would immediately reveal Ilia’s active involvement with the White Fang which would most likely cause Ruby to hate her and that would break Ilia’s heart. “I’m sorry, Ruby, but all I got are stories that involve me in very embarrassing situations that would rather not remember.”

 

“Aww...” Ruby says with a saddened face that makes Ilia want to suddenly hug her and tell her that it is going to be okay.

 

“What about stories from when you were still in combat school?” Ruby asks after a couple moments of contemplation, looking no up at Ilia with very clear intent of getting to know her better.

 

Ilia visibly tenses up for a few moments and unintentionally squeezes Ruby’s hand at the question. Ruby notices this and turns her attention to Ilia with a very worried look on her face.

 

“Ilia, are you okay?” Ruby asks. “Did I ask you something I wasn’t supposed to?”

 

“Not really.” Ilia hesitantly says, hanging her head as she tries to decide how best to approach the subject of what actually happened in her past. “It’s just...”

 

Suddenly, Ruby accidentally walks right into somebody from behind, causing both of them to stumble a bit followed by the sound of something shattering.

 

“Are you okay, Ruby?” Ilia immediately asks as she turns to check on Ruby who nods to confirms that she is okay. Ilia turns toward the person Ruby walked into but freezes up in shock when sees that the person is the suspicious silver haired man from the gym.

 

“Oh gods, I’m sorry Professor Ozpin. I wasn’t paying to where we were going.” Ruby quickly says, apologizing while causing Ilia to internally panic at the mention of Ozpin’s title.

 

“It’s quite alright, Miss Rose. I wasn’t paying attention to where I going either” Ozpin calmly replies before noticing the frozen stiff Ilia. “Oh hello, Miss. I’m Professor Ozpin, Headmaster of Beacon Academy.”

 

“I-I’m I-Ilia Amitola, sir.” Ilia stutters as she tries to maintain a calm expression as her internal panicking evolves into internal screams of terror.

 

“I don’t believe I’ve seen you around here before. Are you visiting?”

 

“Yes sir. I’m here for the tour but i got separated from the tour group.” Ilia truthfully says as she unconsciously moves closer to Ruby, taking ahold of her hand once again. “Thankfully, I ran into Ruby and she offered to give me her version of tour until we catch up with my original tour group.”

 

“I see.” Ozpin says, noticing the closeness between Ilia and Ruby which he raises a curious eyebrow to. “I’ll call Dr. Oobleck to tell him not to worry about your absence and that you’re in capable hands.”

 

“Are you sure, professor?” Ruby hesitantly asks.

 

Ozpin chuckles a little bit. “Who better to give a tour of the school than a student who is already very familiar with the grounds and is a close friend to the one taking the tour?”

 

Ruby and Ilia blush at the question and nervously fidget in their spots while stealing nervous glances at each other. Ozpin goes to take a sip of his beverage to hide the small, amused smirk on his face but quickly realizes that his coffee mug is currently lying on the ground in pieces.

 

“Well, I better get going to find a broom, a dustpan, and give Dr. Oobleck’s tour group a small reprieve from his undoubtedly long winded yet very informative history lesson of whatever section of the school they in.” Ozpin says as he maintains a straight face before turning to leave. “Have a good day, Miss Rose, Miss Amitola.”

 

“You too, professor!” Ruby calls out to Professor Ozpin as he leaves. When Professor Ozpin begins walking away, Ruby turns to face Ilia. “So where were we going to?”

 

“I believe you were going show me the classrooms.” Ilia replies.

 

“Right.” Ruby says before fidgeting. “Um... Ilia?”

 

“Yes?” Ilia asks.

 

“I’m sorry for bringing up unwanted memories.” Ruby apologizes with guilt clear on her face as she nervously shifts in her spot.

 

“It’s ok, Ruby. You couldn’t have known that.” Ilia replies.

 

“But...” Ruby begins to say but is cut off by Ilia hugging her.

 

“It’s ok.” Ilia reaffirms. “Thank you for your concern though.”

 

“Your welcome.” Ruby says, returning the hug. “You don’t have to tell me anything if want to.”

 

“Thanks again.” Ilia replies as they pull apart from the hug. “Though there is a couple things I want to get off my chest.”

 

“What is it?” Ruby inquires

 

“When that H.S. Member confronted us with the police, I panicked... and lied.” Ilia confesses.

 

“Ilia...” Ruby begins to say.

 

“I know you just said I don’t have to say anything but if I don’t say this now, telling you later might it look like I was lying to about everything and ruin things between us forever.”

 

“I... understand.” Ruby says after a moment of thought. “What did you lie about?”

 

“The truth is that my parents died in a mining accident while i was attending a combat school in Atlas...” Ilia begins to explain, catching Ruby off guard. “...and after the accident, I ran away from school after outing myself as a Faunus while trying to defend another Faunus from bullying.”

 

“Were your friends the bullies?”

 

“No they weren’t but instead they just stood around watching and did nothing to stop the bullying which sparked an intense argument between me and them afterwards.”

 

“That’s horrible.” Ruby says with tears threatening to spill out of her eyes. Ruby then takes a couple moments to choose her next question carefully. “Did your attempt to apologize and/or try to stop you from running away?”

 

“I...” Ilia thinks back on this but doesn’t recall anything. “...don’t know. I just ran away and never looked back.”

 

“Then there’s definitely a chance for you to make up with them in the future.” Ruby exclaims with a hopeful expression on her face.

 

Taken back by that statement, Ilia stares at Ruby incredulously, wondering how it was possible for her to meet such a wonderful person. Ruby notices this and stops in her tracks as well. “Did I say something wrong?”

 

“No... no.” Ilia replies, shaking her head. “It’s just... are you sure that’s possible?”

 

“Mhmm.” Ruby hums before a confident look appears on her face. “Sure things will be said and done all the while not going as smoothly as one can hope for. But if they truly are your friends, then they’ll understand and accept why you did what you did over time.”

 

“You’re very amazing.” Ilia whisper, causing Ruby to blush.

 

“I’m not that amazing but thank you though.” Ruby says, causing an obvious offended look to appear on Ilia’s face which Ruby notices the look right away. “Before you say anything, I had a sort of similar experience when I told my friends back at Signal Academy that I got enrolled at Beacon and of the circumstances surrounding said enrollment.”

 

“That doesn’t make you any less amazing.” Ilia simply says, earning a soft smile and a deeper blush from Ruby. “Instead it makes you even more amazing knowing that you were able to gain back those friends of yours. Especially compared to the time me and my friends got away scot free when we accidentally hit the principal’s car stuck on top of a tree.”

 

“Now you’re just buttering me up.” Ruby mutters, blushing profusely while Ilia merely grins. “Well anyways, I believe we were heading towards our next stop on the tour, the classrooms. If you would follow me please.”

 

“After you.” Ilia says before making obvious movements just to hold Ruby’s hand. Ruby does not make any objections to this and moves closer to Ilia as her smile widens.

 

A couple feet into their journey, Ruby realizes what Ilia had said and finds herself very curious on such a thing happened. “Sooo~. How does one get the principal’s car stuck in a tree?”

 

Ilia pauses for a split second before a large grin appears on her face. “Well you see, a couple days before the incident occurred, one of my friends just discovered her semblance…”

 

Ilia regales Ruby with the story as they continue walking towards the main building as Ruby listens intently, laughs at the funny parts, and gives feedback. Soon into their journey, Ilia’s story becomes another story followed by both of them swapping stories of their high school shenanigans and learning tidbits about each other likes and dislikes. Eventually, they arrive at the main building but instead of arriving at the main entrance, they find that they had arrived at a side entrance leading directly to the library.

 

“Oh! It uh... looks like we sort of missed our original destination.” Ruby says with a nervous chuckle and a nervous rub of the back of her head. “B-But no matter! The library is as good of a place to start as any.”

 

They walk up to the door and opens it for Ilia with a courteous bow. “After you.”

 

“Why thank you, milady.” Ilia replies with a thankful bow of her head as she walks through the door.

 

“You’re very welcome.” Ruby replies back as she closed the door behind her. Ruby rushes past Ilia and begins her explanation of the library in a hushed tone.

 

“So welcome to the library where you can find books on from specific Grimm to the history of a specific part of conflict and just about everything in between. But as you can see...” Ruby draws Ilia’s attention to the library which she finds a lot bigger and more crowded than she expected. “...the library is lot more crowded than one would expect.”

 

Ilia notices Emerald and Mercury sitting in a pair of comfy chairs with Emerald nose deep into a text book and Mercury blatantly reading a comic book. Sitting at a table next to them is Team JNPR, from what Ilia can tell from Ruby’s descriptions of them. Nora (?) attempting to absorb the information of the textbook she is sleeping on through osmosis while Pyrrha (?), Ren (?), and Jaune (?) are quietly studying with Ren (?) shooting Quick glances at Nora (?).

 

“Why is that?” Ilia asks, pulling her attention back to Ruby.

 

“Finals Week is taking place right after the festival and everyone, teachers included, are either too busy prepping for the finals and/or for the Vytal tournament.” Ruby explains before sighing heavily. “And the worst part is that none of the teachers have told any of us students that the exams are going to be written, practical or both.”

 

“Oof, sounds rough.” Ilia says, wincing at the thought and memories of past exams along with all of the studying she had to do.

 

“Yep.” Ruby replies, popping the p, nodding her head slightly in agreement just as a thought crosses Ilia’s mind.

 

“Besides giving me a tour, why aren’t you with your team studying or training?” Ilia asks.

 

“We somehow agreed to train for the tournament first and depending on how we do, we use whatever time we have left to study.” Ruby says with a shrug.

 

“Somehow?” Ilia

 

“Yang and Weiss had bit of an argument this morning about this until Yang showed us a couple from previous Vytal tournaments that showed some intense fights and the Amity Stadium central stage itself changing into different biomes for the participants to fight in.” Ruby explains with an excited twinkle appearing in Ruby’s eyes at the end that Ilia definitely notices and finds herself lost in them.

 

“Which led to Yang and Weiss agreeing on a deal where Yang studies since she got herself banned from the on-campus gym while the rest of us train. Which we started doing as soon as classes were over.” Ruby continues explaining, unknowingly breaking Ilia from her trance.

 

“With that said, Yang is studying somewhere, Blake and Weiss are still possibly sparring, and I finally got to meet you...” sorta “...properly.” Ruby nervously finishes with slight blush dusting her cheeks and a squeeze of Ilia’s hand that she recaptured at some point.

 

“Makes sense.” Ilia quickly says, not paying attention to the second part of what Ruby explained before a small smile appears on face with a slight blush as well and a return squeeze of Ruby’s hand.

 

Ruby does her best not to squeal out loud which results in Ruby’s smile growing bigger, vibrating in place, and blushing profusely the color of her cloak. This cascades to Ilia whose smile grows bigger and blush deepens as they both look away from each other shyly. It takes a solid minute for them to calm down after they realize where they still are. Ilia looks around carefully to see if anyone saw them but finds that everyone are still engrossed in what they were doing beforehand.

 

“Anyways that segues into the next destination on our tour: The gym!” Ruby excitedly whispers a giving herself a couple moments to remember where she left off. As Ruby turns to the way the side entrance to the rest of the main building, a loud yelp of surprise catches their attention.

 

Turning to the source of the yelp, they see Cinder sitting on the floor rubbing her lower back as a panicked Pyrrha (?) quickly gets out of a chair to check on Cinder.

 

“Oh! I’m sorry, Cinder!” Pyrrha (?) exclaims. “I should have paid more attention to where I was going.”

 

“Well this better not happen again, Pyrrha.” Cinder grumbles as Pyrrha bends over to check on Cinder.

 

“Here, let me help up.” Pyrrha says, holding out a hand to help Cinder up when she is sure Cinder is okay. Cinder warily looks at Pyrrha’s hand before hesitantly taking her hand with a look of slight disgust as Pyrrha pulls her up.

 

“Er... thank you...” Cinder hesitantly says, unsure what to say in that situation as she dusts off her uniform.

 

“You’re welcome.” Pyrrha awkwardly replies.

 

At the same time as this happening, Emerald quickly gets up and rushes over to check just as Jaune (?) stands up to do the same at the wrong moment. Which causes them trip over one another with Emerald falling onto her back followed quickly Jaune (?) falling face first on top of her. Emerald stares at Jaune (?) with a shocked scowl on her face as Jaune (?) sits up quickly with a shocked look on his face that has a faint blush appearing on his cheeks.

 

“Are you gonna get off or keep enjoying the view, Jaune?” Emerald pointedly asks while giving Jaune a very annoyed glare.

 

“Oh, right. Sorry!” Jaune quickly replies before he stands up just as quickly as his reply, hitting the table with his back which wakes Nora up. Nora lifts up her from the open textbook and looks upon the scene.

 

“Ren, what happened?” She asks as Cinder and emerald separate themselves from Jaune and Pyrrha to rejoin Mercury, who has witnessing the scene unfold from over the top of the comic he’s reading with a hidden smile on his face.

 

“An accident.” Ren plainly states as he starts cleaning up their mess.

 

“What’s their problem?” Ilia asks, gesturing to Team CEM.

 

“No idea.” Ruby replies, stroking her chin with free hand. She turns back to the side entrance and tugs on Ilia’s hand, telling her that they are moving on.

 

They leave the library without further incident but leaves Ilia unsure if Team CEM saw them or not. But the thoughts vanish from Ilia’s head when Ruby begins humming as they walk down the hallway, prompting Ilia to move closer.

 

They walk for a few more minutes in this comfortable bubble they created, only stopping by Professor Port’s, Dr. Oobleck’s, and Professor Peach’s classrooms to give a quick rundown of which belongs to who and who teaches what. Further along in their tour as they approach the door to the combat classroom, they hear muffled sounds of metal echo through the door, indicating that multiple people are fighting.

 

Ruby and Ilia look through the doors window to find a bow-less Blake sparring against a determined Weiss in the middle of a large semicircular arena. Ilia looks on with great curiosity as Weiss doesn’t react to Blake’s cute kitty ears as they go at each other like they are dancing instead of sparring. Ruby remembers what Ilia said about not wanting to meet Blake just yet. So she tugs on Ilia’s arm to get attention as holds a finger to her lips and Ilia nods her head in acknowledgment as they silently walk away from the door towards the gym.

 

“So as you that was the classroom for the Combat Class that Professor Goodwitch teaches.” Ruby begins to explain when she is sure that they are out Blake’s gearing range.

 

“Which explains the arena in front of the stadium like seating.” Ilia deduces.

 

“Yep!” Ruby ecstatically replies, popping the p. “And the purpose of the class is to teach us the advantages, disadvantages, and dangers of fighting one or more non-Grimm opponents.”

 

“How useful.” Ilia simply says mostly to herself as she briefly thinks about what might have happened if she stayed in school.

 

“I know, right?” Ruby rhetorically asks. “I was surprised how useful such a skill was when fighting Torchwick and his White Fang allies.”

 

Ilia involuntarily tenses up without Ruby noticing the slightest of hand squeezes at the mention of the White Fang. So Ilia changes the subject quickly. “Speaking of arenas, I noticed a cute little sparkle in your beautiful eyes when mentioned how the Amity Stadium arena changes biomes. What is that about?”

 

Ruby briefly becomes the color of her cloak at the way Ilia way describes her eyes before taking a deep breath to calm herself. “Oof... where to start? I guess the complexity of how the arena switches biomes is a good place to start because oooh boy. I thought building and maintaining my baby, Crescent Rose, was complex. But the thought of that stage going from a warm savannah biome to a frozen landscape within a few minutes is perplexing.”

 

Ilia nods her head in agreement and contemplates such a feat as well. They walk along the corridor, bouncing theories off of each other with the most plausible being a shrink ray that atlas secretly developed but found it useless in real world combat and the theory being an optical illusion combined with realistic holograms projected over force barriers for the sake of hyper realism. As they discuss the power requirements for keeping the stadium afloat and maintaining power for everything else, the walk by the entrance to gym without either of them noticing.

 

When the do notice, Ruby is already pushing open the door leading outside. They find themselves at the side entrance opposite of the one leading into the library along with the fact that they have a direct path to the church like building in front of them.

 

Ruby looks between where the and the church like building guiltily as she unsure if she should to the gym or skip the gym and continue on. Ilia notices Ruby’s dilemma and places a hand on her shoulder. “I don’t mind skipping the gym. I’m sure that it is like a regular gym but is more advanced so it can accommodate hunters and huntresses?”

 

“Ehh... more or less.” Ruby replies.

 

“So what’s our next stop?” Ilia asks scanning the grounds.

 

“Well, since we’re skipping gym, the next destination on the tour is one of the most important places here on campus... THE CAFETERIA!!!” Ruby excitedly exclaims, striking a proud heroic pose which is followed quickly by her stomach rumbling very audibly.

 

Ilia falls into a fit of giggles that finds that she likes the sound of until Ilia stop giggling when her own stomach rumbles as well. This time it is Ruby’s turn to fall into a fit of giggles that Ilia finds to be a sound she likes as well as Ruby leads both of them towards what Ilia assumes is the cafeteria.

 

As they get closer to the cafeteria, the smell of the food gets stronger and stronger which makes their stomach growl even louder. As they enter the sort of empty cafeteria, Ilia stares up in awe at the high vaulted ceiling that remind her of a cathedral’s interior as they navigate a small maze of lunch tables and other students.

 

“Is there a limit on what you order?” Ilia asks, noticing the large empty buffet trays when they approach the line to order food.

 

“Not really just as long as you don’t order anything too crazy.” Ruby replies with dismissive shrug.

 

“Really?!” Ilia exclaims.

 

Ruby snorts a laugh at this exclamation. “Uh-huh. You’d be surprised by what they have back there.”

 

“Hmm we’ll see.” Ilia simply says, thinking of what she is going to order. The line in front of them moves quickly as the people in front quickly their food until it is Ruby and Ilia’s turn.

 

“Good day ladies, what can I get started for you?” The staff member cheerfully greets.

 

“I’ll have the usual to go.” Ruby replies.

 

“And I’ll have a bowl of homemade apple cinnamon oatmeal with a crunchy peanut butter and grape jelly sandwich and a large cup of apple cider to go as well.” Ilia orders, unsure what Ruby has planned and catching the staff member and Ruby slightly off guard but the staff member jots down the order anyways with a knowing smirk.

 

“Anything else?” The staff member asks for clarification but Ruby and Ilia shake their heads no. “Alrighty then. Your food will be ready in a few minutes.”

 

As the staff member pins the order on to the order queue for the cooks to begin making the meals, Ruby and Ilia move out of the line to stand near the food pick up window. They stand there waiting as they watch kitchen staff members make a show of moving various food around the kitchen which includes a couple whole cooked turkey and an entire swordfish.

 

“Oatmeal and a peanut butter and jelly sandwich is an odd choice to challenge the cooks.” Ruby states. “Why choose that?”

 

“Well...” Ilia begins to say, nervously rubbing the back of her head as she figures how to best explain her reason. “It’s something that parents used to make me for breakfast whenever they had time to do so which was a pretty rare occasion. Plus, the last time I had this meal was a couple weeks before they died.”

 

“Aww… that’s so sad.” Ruby says, sniffling a little bit as fights to hold back her tears while stroking the back of Ilia’s hand in a comforting manner.

 

“Thanks Ruby.” Ilia softly says.

 

“And if those cooks screw up your order, they’ll get an earful from me.” Ruby announces, puffing out her chest in an attempt to make herself look tough. The sight of Ruby doing this causes Ilia devolve into fit of giggles along with a couple of kitchen staff members saw what happened.

 

“My hero...” Ilia dreamily says, taking in how adorable Ruby looks right now.

 

“Order for Ruby Rose.” A kitchen staff loudly announces ruining the moment as they set down two plastic bags filled with Styrofoam containers and a pair of lidded cups on the counter in front of the pick-up window.

 

“Thank you.” Ruby says as she walks up to the window and grabs their meals.

 

“You’re welcome, Miss Rose and enjoy the rest of your date.” The staff member calls out as Ruby leaves, causing she and Ilia to look at the staff member with deer-caught-in-the-headlight looks before blushing up a storm.

 

Ruby and Ilia quickly retreat from cafeteria, leaving behind the staff member who is now chuckling slightly as they return to work. Outside the cafeteria, Ruby takes Ilia’s hand then proceeds to lead her to a shaded spot underneath a nearby tree. Ilia chuckles when she sees where Ruby has lead her.

 

“What?” Ruby asks when they reach the tree, unsure if the chuckles are a good or bad thing.

 

“Maybe that staff member was right about this being a date.” Ilia as they sit down on the ground.

 

“How so?” Ruby inquires as she eagerly unpacks the food.

 

“Well when we first started out, it was a tour. But now that we are here like this, the tour turned into one which I am ok with happening.” Ilia explains as Ruby hands Ilia her food.

 

“The feeling is very mutual.” Ruby replies as she opens up the largest container in her and hungrily eyes the cookies that lay before her.

 

“Wow. Do you want a little dinner to go with that desert?” Ilia skeptically asks, trying to be funny when she sees the large plate of piled on chocolate chip cookies and bowl of strawberries sitting on her lap. Ruby perks up at the Ilia’s question, stopping mid bite into the cookie in her hand. She notices that Ilia hasn’t noticed what she said and comes up with a mischievous idea.

 

“Are you asking me out on a proper date, Ms. Amitola?” Ruby asks in her best seductive voice that is accompanied by her attempt at a seductive look as she balances her food on her lap.

 

“I... er... um...” Ilia sputters as she realizes the implications of what she said as her skin slowly becomes a noticeable pink. Ruby struggles to hold back a laugh while preparing to brush off the question as a joke.

 

“I’m... uh... sure... I’m definitely sure!” Ilia says with more confidence and her skin becoming less pink. “But I’m not sure if this is the right moment to ask such a thing.”

 

Ruby sits there slack jawed staring for a moment not expecting Ilia’s answer before blushing profusely herself and looking away shyly. “Th-then are you f-free to stay over for tonight?”

 

Ilia’s face darkens with regret. “Unfortunately I can’t because of an overnight job I was hired to do in a...” Ilia carefully pulls out her scroll and checks the time. “...couple of hours.”

 

“Aww...” Ruby visibly deflates at this information.

 

“But!” Ilia suddenly exclaims, shocking Ruby out of her glumness. “I am definitely available tomorrow night.”

 

‘ _Because if all goes according to plan, I can kill two birds with one stone without Cinder and her ever realizing it._ ’ Ilia says in her head.

 

“So what did you have in mind?” Ilia asks, leaning towards the visibly, excited Ruby.

 

“Well my dad managed to send me all four Indiana Jones movies and I was thinking of us doing a marathon of them in my dorm room with homemade snacks and dinner.”

 

“Hmm, that sounds lovely.” Ilia states as her stomach rumbles to tell her that she hasn’t eaten anything yet. Obeying her stomach, she opens the lid to her oatmeal and is hit with a wave of tear jerking nostalgia as the smell of baked apple and cinnamon enters her nose. Taking a spoonful, she hesitates to to take the bite due to a slight fear of that it won’t Rasta’s good as she remembers. But when she does take the bite, she metaphorically dies and goes to heaven as the deliciousness of the taste causes her to moan in deep satisfaction.

 

“It’s good to know that I won’t be giving the kitchen staff an earful anytime soon.” Ruby whispers to herself, chuckling at the sight of Ilia enjoying her food before resuming the rapid consumption of her own meal.

 

They stay like this for a few minutes, enjoying their food as the world around idly passes them by. Eventually, they set their empty food containers onto the ground and lean back against the tree full.

 

“So, what’s the next stop on the tour?” Ilia lazily asks.

 

“That would be the machine shop, the final stop of the tour.” Ruby lazily replies.

 

“The final stop already?” Ilia rhetorically inquires before checking the time on her scroll. “Today went by far too quickly.”

“At least you got spend it with me instead of attempting to keep up Dr. Oobleck all day as he flits from area to another.” Ruby points out.

 

“True.” Ilia says as she trembles slightly at what could have been if she hadn’t gotten knocked over by Ruby. They take a deep breath and continue to relax as they take in the peacefulness of their surroundings when Ilia gets an idea.

 

“You know I do have a couple hours before I absolutely have to leave and it has been awhile since I gave my whip proper maintenance.” Ilia suggests. “How about we go do maintenance on our weapons and maybe build some Rose Thorn prototypes to work out some of the kinks in the design?”

 

“Good idea.” Ruby replies, nodding her head in agreement as she stands up.

 

She picks up all of trash and zooms to the nearest trash can to throw it away then zooms to where Ilia is and holds out a hand. Ilia takes Ruby’s outstretched hand and Ruby lifts her off the ground a little too fast, resulting in them almost kissing. They quickly separate themselves from one another, feeling that wasn't the right time for a kiss.

 

“Onwards to the dorms again, I guess.” Ruby shyly announces as both of them try not to be distracted by what almost happened.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Happy Valentine's Day

**Author's Note:**

> Confessions of an Author: Hey, FalseRobot here to tell you that Unexpected Situations (my other story) is now officially on hiatus until further notice since somehow I encountered writer's block while writing the 4th chapter (which still isn't done yet). At the same time of the appearance of the writer's block appearing, a couple of RWBY story ideas just randomly popped into my head and stayed ever since then. In the meantime, I am going to be writing this story and a couple of other RWBY stories until I regain the motivation to continue Unexpected Situations.
> 
> Also, feedback and comments of any sort is very much appreciated. It would help me gauge how well I am doing and allow me to see if I missed any mistakes I unknowingly made when writing.


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